PM and uh welcome to the April 21st City Council work session.

Thanks to all of you for being here.

Uh tonight we're gonna get a legislative update from our government affairs person, uh director uh Ariel Nelson.

But before then, I just want to let you know that uh Councilor Allcare will be attending online, and then Councillor Anne Vary will be coming a little late.

So just so you all know that.

Uh Robbie, do you have anything else?

Uh no, that's it.

Thanks, Mayor.

Ariel, take it away.

All right, thanks everyone.

Um, Ariel Nelson here, your government relations manager with a post-legislative session update.

I'll give just a second for the slides to load.

Um these slides will look very familiar.

It's essentially the same framework that I presented last time I was before you in a work session, which is mid-February for a mid-session update.

Um, and so now we have the after action report.

And um, so we'll this is and this is largely focused around the city's uh legislative priorities with a little bit more context than some of the major themes from session.

So similar structure again to what you've seen before.

Uh happy to take questions throughout.

So just a reminder that this was a short legislative session, which we have every even numbered years, very past fast pace for legislation.

Um, so one addition on this slide, uh, the actual uh date of adjournment of signing die for the legislature.

Their constitutional deadline was March 8th, and the legislature adjourned on Friday, March 6th at 418 p.m.

Um, so these are the major themes we've talked about before in session.

Um, as you know, coming into the session, lawmakers faced a dual budget challenge.

So they had um a roughly 750 million dollar shortfall in the general fund driven primarily by the passage of the federal HR one bill, and which had a major impact to Oregon revenues.

Um, and then a separate approximately $300 million gap at the Oregon Department of Transportation that was left unresolved after Republicans referred the 2025 transportation package, namely the the fees in the package to the ballots.

So legislative leadership in this case, the partying power democrats closed this gap.

Um they were succeeded in doing that primarily by disconnecting portions of Oregon's tax code from select federal position uh federal provisions.

So as a reminder, Oregon's tax code automatically connects to the federal tax code, and when the HR1 passed, um there were some major shortfalls because Oregon's code mirrored the federal.

So uh they passed Senate Bill 1507, um, which disconnected strategically from pieces of the federal tax code and generated about 311 million for the general fund.

Um, shortly after that bill passed, Republicans announced their intention to refer the measure to voters.

They also saw um saw an improved revenue forecast in session.

Um, so that helped the shortage, the shortfall.

And then they were also able to make some modest spending trims through agency budgets, largely through keeping vacated positions open, reducing agency supply budgets, and so they were able to cover the remainder of the budget shortfall.

Any questions on that?

Um, so there were two key transportation funding bills this session.

Next major theme.

Um, as you know, uh the transportation package that passed um in the 2025 special session was referred.

Uh, major components of that, the revenue raising measures were referred to the ballot.

Um, and so the legislature introduced Senate Bill 1599, which moved the election date for the ballot measure referral from the November general election to the May primary.

Um, shortly after this was Senate Bill 1599.

Shortly after that passed, um, Republican representative and gubernatorial candidate uh Ed Deal announced his intention to seek a judicial order blocking the bill from taking effect on constitutional grounds.

Um, this was probably the most politically charged uh bill in debate this session.

Um, and then uh I think it was March 11th, a few weeks ago, a Marion County judge declined to block the May election.

So it is gonna go forward on that ballot.

The other major transportation bill was Senate Bill 1601, which addressed um some additional transportation funding shortfall through ODOT vacancy savings.

It also um closed the gap by redirecting federal funds.

Um they redrifted federal funds, sorry, and then the rest was backfilled by reallocating funds from some statewide programs, some of which come to local communities, um, things like pedestrian safety programs, seismic retrofits, rail projects, and vehicle electric electrification funds to shore up the state road maintenance and preservation.

This provides a path forward for ODOT until we expect the legislature to take up a new funding package in the next 2027 legislative session.

Of course, this does not address local city and county funding needs not met by the current state highway fund revenues.

And lawmakers and transportation officials acknowledge the fix is not sustainable.

The bill that passed, we need long-term revenue solutions.

So we expect that conversation to continue.

Last month, also Governor KOTEC announced she would convene a transportation work group to develop a framework for a comprehensive package in 2027.

So we'll be watching that.

This session, the other major themes, of course, saw significant legislative action on both economic development and ICE response, which I will cover in the next slides.

We'll get into more detail.

And all told the we saw this session 304 bills introduced.

Part of major reason for that is there are bill limit limitations in the short session.

Of those, 153 bills or measures passed the legislature.

However, um it's actually 152 that made it into law because notably the governor just vetoed House Bill 4177, which made updates and clarifications to ethics serial meetings laws.

And so well, we can we can do more than that if there's questions on that one.

But that was the bill, the only bill she vetoed this session.

She also bills can go into law without the governor's signature or with her signature, and of the bills she signed.

She did include a signing letter with the federal disconnect bill that I mentioned, um, Senate Bill 1507 due to um concerns raised by some of the business community about impacts of some of the changes made there.

So she acknowledged those concerns and kind of made a commitment to look into them and make potential changes in 2027.

Any questions before I move on to the uh city's priorities?

All right.

So just a quick reminder we had three state priorities federal immigration enforcement response, economic development, and housing production and homelessness response.

So under federal immigration enforcement response, um, I don't have to explain to you all um Oregon communities across the state were in crisis as legislators returning to Salem.

Um the local conversation was happening here and in a number of communities.

Um there were significant impacts on immigrant communities.

And so we saw large um push from Democrats.

Um it was a pretty partisan effort.

It wasn't bipartisan in this case, um, to introduce a suite of bills pushing back on federal immigration enforcement and federal immigration policy.

Um, those bills sought to clarify the obligations of institutions from schools to hospitals when interacting with federal agents and to establish procedural safeguards around access to private areas of certain facilities, address concerns about massed and unidentified federal agents operating in Oregon.

So Hillsborough, as you know.

Mr.

Brown, I'm gonna ask you not to speak during the work session if you want to make a comment.

You can you can make the comments in the city council meeting.

It's all about so as you know, Hillsborough's priority uh was about supporting legislation to sink to strengthen the state's Sanctuary Promise Act, um, including but not limited to funding support.

I'll kind of touch on the highlights, funding support for families and small businesses that are impacted by increased immigration enforcement.

Um, we call that increased rent and utility assistance, similar supports the city had put out at the local level.

Um the legislature did not approve funding for rent, utility or small business support.

However, it did direct 10 million dollars toward immigration defense and refugee assistance.

I think this is notable considering um we went into the to the session with um in this budget cut scenario and with budget authors, budget co-chairs saying, you know, no new funding, no asks.

So um, well, reactionaries.

Mr.

Brown, if you speak again, I will ask you to leave.

Thank you very much.

Please continue, Ariel.

Um the other another priority um from Hillsborough was legislation to strengthen state laws related to technology, data sharing, public records to protect sensitive information, um, and strengthen that Sanctuary Promise Act.

So we saw three bills pass.

Um Senate Bill 1516 limits how law enforcement collects uses and shares automatic license plate readers, ALPRs, um, and provides um required terms for contracts with vendors in terms of um tightening um data sharing, and it creates a private right of action for vendor misuse of data, um, like in violation of the state law.

Uh there's also a bill that protects personal data from being sold or shared for immigration enforcement purposes, packing down on data brokers.

And they also passed a bill to strengthen anti-discrimination protections to help immigrants work access courts interact with law enforcement without fear.

And last, um, we saw two bills focused on requiring law enforcement to be clearly identified, limit the use of masking.

So we probably engaged most directly with House Bill 4138, which expands statewide law enforcement visibility standards and limits masking.

Um another bill also increased transparency and accountability for federal and out-of-state law enforcement operating in Oregon, kind of getting into where uh agencies are acting with non-judicial warrants and trying to place some safeguards around that.

I have a question around that.

You have one too.

Uh, Counselor Sinclair, go ahead.

Uh thank you, Ariel, for the information.

Is it possible to get an itemized list of all the safety promise acts that were passed so that it's easy access for the public?

Yeah, so I forgot to mention at the front, um, the legislative report, the full legislative report is in your council materials and it and it covers every bill that we tracked, um, not just the ones I highlighted here.

So you'll see that full list under the immigration section.

Thank you.

Yeah, you bet.

Um, Ariel, the big issue that I see with with all of this is that we can put out whatever we want as a as a city or a county or a state, but we have trouble enforcing it to federal agencies because we don't have authority over them.

Was there any conversation around that?

There was.

Um, you know, it was there was a lot of recognition and discussion of the federal supremacy clause.

Um, I think that legislators recognized that and felt they had to do at least something in their lawmaking legislative capacity.

Um, I think there is also an understanding that we've been most expect uh effective.

We um the state um through the attorney general's office and other legal action, whether it's from a city, local government, or the state.

So um just they're gonna throw you know, throw everything at the wall, hope it sticks, at least have the laws on the books.

Um, I think the council had a conversation earlier on at the local level about you know, we can at least document violations and at some point hold hold violators responsible.

But okay.

But but there's still the supremacy clause issue.

Yeah, I think there's a similar frustration that has been felt at the local level.

Yeah.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

Any other questions?

All right.

Uh so next we'll turn to economic development.

Um, I've highlighted the Oregon Jobs Act, um, which was obviously the city's um uh major uh priority under this topic this session.

Um the legislative report, um, I'll mention again, includes a number of bills related to economic development, um, which for the majority of the bills that passed largely study the issue or stand-up workforces, uh work groups, excuse me, or add funding to agencies to work on issues.

There were really only two significant economic development bills this session, the Oregon Jobs Act, which I think you're quite familiar with at this point, was championed by a broad coalition of supporters, um, but ultimately, of course, did not pass this session.

And the other bill was Governor Kotex's economic development bill, House Bill 4084.

Um, there were some similarities between the two bills.

Both bills addressed issues with slow state permit processes and Oregon's lackluster economic development and incentives, um, and like uh in terms of competitiveness with other states.

Um, the jobs act, of course, took on the issue of lack of industrial land supply, while the governor's legislation focused on Oregon's dramatically underfunded industrial site readiness program.

Um, and her bill made updates to the enterprise zone program.

Um, of course, House Bill 4084 did pass.

Um, it uh was received 15 million dollars.

Um she had proposed 40 million um originally, but 15 million was included for industrial site readiness.

Um, and then the bill also included a late-stage amendment that placed a two-year moratorium on data center eligibility for enterprise zones.

Any questions before I move on?

And the last priority, uh housing production and homelessness response.

Uh, this was um largely successful this session, noting also noting that um there weren't particularly controversial or major policies at play, like there have been on housing.

There's been a huge housing focus in previous sessions.

Um, but uh Hillsborough supported um several bills that did pass um defending state investments and housing production, housing related infrastructure, run assistance and shelter capacity in the budget cuts environment was that was a priority for us and for a lot of cities and partners.

So Senate Bill 5701 passed, that's the state bonding bill, and it importantly included 100 million dollars in general obligation bonds for the development of affordable rental housing.

And 25 million uh was is focused on preserving existing affordable housing.

So that's important infusion that goes out through the state housing agency available to communities like Hillsborough to support affordable housing projects.

We also prioritized um seeking improvement and renewal of existing local option tools, policies, and programs.

House Bill 4037 passed this was a very technical bill that largely um kind of made incremental updates to a bunch of the major housing legislation that passed in previous sessions.

Um there were also some pieces of the bill that had been introduced that would have been really difficult to implement in concert with all the other um changes.

Um Hillsborough worked in coalition with other cities with the League of Oregon cities and got the bill to a place where we felt um you know able to support it.

And then last um the city supported legislation to improve access and implementation for the one-time urban growth boundary amendment tool that the legislature had established in 2024.

So House Bill 4035 passed uh Hillsboro had participated in a legislative work group ahead of session to help inform this bill.

It updates the state's program again.

Um it allows cities a one-time urban growth boundary expansion for housing if cities meet certain criteria.

Um the bill that hit passed in 2024 was um too restrictive.

There was only maybe two cities that were able to apply for it.

So it's been broadened a little bit in terms of how cities demonstrate housing need to apply for the program to use the tool.

Um, so more cities will now be able eligible to use the program, including Hillsboro.

That it will be a local decision and local conversation whether or not to pursue that.

So that's that is everything I've covered for the legislature.

Council case, sorry.

Um that Metro helps with that one, right?

The UGB stuff didn't make that up.

No, I mean, normal uh we typically go through a metro process.

Okay, if you expansion, this is kind of not with the state likes to use the word notwithstanding, it's outside that process.

Okay.

You apply to the OCD.

Got it.

Okay, thank you.

Metro plays a role in terms of how it impacts their process and they coordinate inside of it, but it's a it's a state tool.

Counselor Sinclair.

So when you say one time tools, it's kind of like you know, with SB4 when the government had a one-time it's it's similar but different.

Yeah, so the SB4 was an executive um authority.

This is statutory.

So I can get you the details.

I think DLC will probably have to update their materials, but essentially a city would apply through DLC and provide notice that they're going to do this.

Um, and there's a limited, it's it's not a regular land use process that wouldn't really go through public hearing and notice and appeal.

It's a it's a more limited outline.

Yeah, and it's one time.

So this um program has a sunset um 10 years from passage, so in 2034, I think.

Um, and you so a city can only use the tool one time in that 10-year period, and then it um sunsets and is no longer on the books.

Thank you.

Okay.

And that that's that's the end of my presentation.

Again, focused on the priorities.

The full report is in your materials.

Uh if you want to read about many, many more bills than this.

And I'm always happy to answer questions if you've had questions about other legislation that passed or may not have passed.

Could I um just throw you a little bit of a curveball area?

Would you mind just giving them a really quick uh summary of the governor's prosperity council and the the um task force on data centers just so that they're aware of kind of what's going on there?

Yeah, and I'm happy if it's okay, Robby.

There's a number of things that we're tracking in what we call the interim period.

Um there was kind of a flurry of activity after a session ended that felt a little unusual.

It felt really busy.

Um, but this is typically where things kind of quiet down and we start to see a number of legislative or governor directed or agency work groups, task forces.

Sometimes a bill directs them.

This works, sometimes a legislator will just convene something.

Um we've got a few that the governor has stood up, as Robbie mentioned.

So the main the ones that are on my list that are current we're currently tracking are um the governor's prosperity council, which she had announced going into session.

Um they are meeting regularly, doing um uh listening sessions around the state and are expected to make recommendations uh to the governor, uh, I believe end of June on June 30, too.

Yeah, June 30th on a direction um policies she can take to improve Oregon's economic development and economic climate.

Um so that process is underway.

Uh it's a little hard to track the meetings are largely not public meetings, um, but they have done some extensive outreach with um and taken in lots of surveys, facilitated groups.

Again, they're traveling around the state.

Um, so uh we'll be tracking in what to see what comes out of that effort.

The governor also stood up a data center advisory council, which has been holding monthly meetings from a variety of sources, stakeholders, entities about data centers, kind of fact finding.

And they're also going to charged to make recommendations to the governor by I believe October, although it sounds like they may be actually coming out a bit earlier in July, June or July with their recommendations for the governor.

Hillsboro presented last month.

They had asked for questions about impacts on water supply.

So that was a presentation.

And that this week's or this month is at the end of this week, the presentation will be on land use.

So that's ongoing.

They're also expected to look at energy, look at they've you know, kind of heard what the you know revenue impacts, economic development impacts at the local level, environmental impacts.

So they're they're taking a range of testimony.

Um I also mentioned the governor's transportation work group is starting to get underway.

Um representative um Gamba, a former um city of Milwaukee mayor and representative is also um leading a work group related to energy facility siding in the land use system will get underway.

Um the governor also um issued an executive order um a couple months back, also around energy facility siding, has charged her state agencies with looking at removing barriers to citing renewable energy to help meet the state's uh climate goals.

Um agencies like DLCD, Department of Energy are expected to put out recommendations and work plans.

Um I mentioned, let's see.

So, yeah, that's that's what we're tracking.

We also um monitor and participate in the League of Oregon Cities policy committee process.

So that is underway.

That is how the League of Oregon Cities sets their legislative agenda for the next two years.

So it will be their agenda for 2027 and we'll carry into the short session.

And so um, I think Councillor Slogato is on the telecom and broadband committee.

Um, and Dan Dias is um serving on both the the community development committee and the tax finance and economic development committee that they have representation from all corners of the state, all size cities, and kind of put forward um a slate of priorities to recommend that goes out to each city.

So I think typically um uh I I'll usually email it out to you all and kind of get your feedback on how you want to rank the the priorities um under each policy area and usually the top I don't know, five to ten depending on the year and what the issues are, um, take uh inform what the league's legislative agenda is going forward.

Counselor Sergato.

Yeah, on the sorry forgot the name of the number of the bill, the one that detaches us from the HR1 tax incentives.

1507.

Is the depreciation incentive the only item that that's touching, or are there other incentives that weren't listed?

So that was I think the one that got the most um pushback and items that moved forward.

Um, I'd have to go look into the details.

Um, there were some other notable changes, but I can I can send you um more more information on the bill follow up with you and also the governor's signing letter if you're interested.

Okay, that'd be great.

Thanks.

Okay.

Any other questions?

Thanks for taking us through that area.

Appreciate it.

Thanks for the questions.

Oh, uh counselor case.

I'm sorry.

Okay, we mentioned this at the beginning, the OGAC updates, and then the governor.

Can we walk us through that?

Like sure.

So we still know clarity on how we can engage.

So I think there were total in Chad, you can correct me.

I think there's three bills um that were that passed the legislative legislature this session.

One had to do with um called it the hot dog rule.

They all kind of stem from OGEC's interpretation of existing statute, newer newer legislation.

Um, and so there's clarity around when cities can provide like potluck food and things like that.

There's um some clarity around some other pieces.

Um, and and the one that um had a really you know really deep work group um through representative SOS actually led the work group on all these bills, and the one that the governor vetoed, House Bill 4177 provided clarity on serial meetings laws and ethics rules.

And um despite a you know, a pretty um intensive work group process, including participation from the governor's office, um there were some concerns raised kind of at the end of the legislative process um from um journalists that this was the bill was creating a loophole despite um all of the attorneys participating, explaining what the legal case law said and how this was not creating a loophole, it's just clarifying and allowing um elected officials to receive information and have conversations without you know, but still still preventing them from deliberating in private or you know, reaching a decision, not in a public meeting.

Um unfortunately, you know, the governor um had pressure from journalists and editorial boards um to be to the bill, and so she did.

Um I think we're hoping to see um the uh commitment from her to a recognition that there's clarity still needed, clarification still needed um in this law, and so hopefully there's some work to be done in 2027.

Any other questions?

Robbie, you got anything else?

No.

Okay, uh work session is adjourned.

Thank you very much, Ariel, for the briefing.

We will uh have our city council meeting that starts at seven in uh Maine Auditorium.

Thanks, everybody.

Good evening, and welcome to the April 21st City Council uh meeting.

You made it.

And before we get started, um I'd like to This meeting is being recorded.

Before we get started, if you want to, please feel free to join us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to other for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and domestic law.

Thank you.

May I please have a roll call, Mayor Pace?

Here, Councillor Harris, here, Councillor Anvary here, Councillor Salgado, here, Councillor Case, here, Councillor Sinclair, here, Councillor Alcair.

Here, thank you.

For those of you in the audience, just so you know, Councillor Alcare is attending the meeting online, uh, just so you know.

All right, uh, our first item, uh, item two is presentations and appointments, and I will come down to the podium there and I'll be reading a proclamation about the missing and murdered indigenous persons awareness day, which is May 5th.

Welcome.

And joining me at the podium today is Jeanette Harrison, the director of the Native Performing Arts Network, and she has some of her colleagues joining her.

Jeanette, do you want to introduce them as well?

We have Marisa Sanchez, who's the operations manager at Native Performing Arts Network, Alex Hollis, who is the managing director of advanced gender equity in the arts, and Teya Dixon, who is a company member at Bag and Baggage Productions.

Thanks so much, Jeanette.

Uh I'd now like to read the proclamation.

Whereas the enduring impact of colonization and historically oppressive policies are closely linked to increased violence against American Indian and Alaska Native peoples, including indigenous women, girls, and two spirit relatives, and whereas indigenous women, girls, men, boys, LGBTQ, I plus two spirit, transgender, and gender non-conforming people face heightened risk of murder, sexual assault, human trafficking, exploitation, and abduction, suffering from disproportionate visibility and delayed justice.

And whereas ongoing systemic racism and the legacy of colonization have exacerbated poverty, homelessness, incarceration, and violence, disproportionately affecting American Indian and Alaska Native communities compared to their non-Indigenous counterparts.

And whereas Hillsboro is committed to addressing the root causes and systemic obstacles contributing to this persistent crisis, aiming to mitigate violence against indigenous peoples.

And whereas Hillsboro recognizes missing and murdered indigenous persons awareness day and joins tribal, local, regional, and national entities, organizations, advocates, families, and survivors commemorating the lives of those lost or missing.

And whereas to increase awareness and demonstrate solidarity on missing and murdered indigenous persons awareness day, residents of the city of Hillsboro are encouraged to wear red.

Now, therefore, be it resolved that I, Beach Pace, mayor of the city of Hillsborough, Oregon, do hereby proclaim May 5th, 2026 as missing and murdered Indigenous Persons Awareness Day, and to increase awareness and demonstrate solidarity.

Residents of the City of Hillsborough are encouraged to wear red on this day.

Thank you.

And uh please, yeah, go ahead.

I'd now like to invite Jeanette Harrison up to say a few words about May 5th and some actions you can take.

Thank you.

Oh, and here's the proclamation.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Nyawe, Mayor Beach Pace, and the City Council, and also the city staff who made this happen.

Um, the whole impetus for this um action today is because the Native Performing Arts Network last year, we realized that of the works that our native youth were creating in our arts education program, short films, plays, monologues, 75% of those projects that our kids were creating dealt with missing and murdered indigenous women in some way, shape, or form.

This this topic is top of mind for them, and yet in the mainstream society, it's practically invisible.

So we as adults have a responsibility to our youth to not just hold this, but to take action and change it so that they do not have to carry this forward.

Despite the fact that 75% of our youth uh have this at the have this issue at the top of their minds, 95% of Native women who go missing do not make the national news.

In the urban institute, the Urban Indian Institute of Health's study, where they try to track data to get a better idea of just how prevalent this issue was in urban communities where the majority of Native people live.

Only 40% of police departments across the country bothered to respond to the survey.

So we still do not have a clear idea of the depths of this crisis.

However, what we can share is that in some communities, Native women face rates of murder that are more than 10 times higher than national average.

So I thank the City of Hillsborough for taking action and raising awareness and visibility for this crisis.

Awareness and visibility is just the first step, and we encourage you to take a first step with our city of Hillsborough by joining us on May 5th for the National Day of Theatre Readings for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Relatives.

My colleagues will pass out some postcards about that reading that will take place just a couple blocks from here at 350 East Main Street at Bag and Baggage.

Um it is a an award-winning product, an award-winning play that has not yet had a production.

It's called I is for Invisible by Cherokee Playwright Delena Studi.

And we hope that you'll join us and uh learn more about this issue.

And also, it's a heavy issue, but Native families deal with it with laughter with joy with coming together in community and holding this issue together.

Please join us in carrying this weight.

Please join us in the joy.

Please join us in the love.

Please join us in the community and help us make this weight a little less heavy for our children.

Thank you.

You want to take a photo?

Oh, great.

Okay, now we're moving to item three, public comment.

Persons wishing to speak will be recognized at this time.

If you are here in person and wish to provide public comment not related to item eight point one, please fill out a yellow card and hand it to the city recorder.

Those wishing to speak on item 8.1 should fill out a blue card, and you will be called during the public hearing for item 8.1.

Uh just to be clear, um, if you 8.1 is regarding uh St.

John the Baptist Church.

So if you want to comment on something other than that, uh please fill out a yellow card.

And if you want to comment on the issue with the church or what's coming before us with the church, fill out a blue card and give it to Aubrey Beneer, Aubrey Manier, right over here, our deputy city recorder.

Uh, when I call on you, please join us here at the table and speak into the microphone so those on Zoom can also hear your comments.

Uh, we have a translation tool uh which allows community members uh to speak in their own language, and this city recorder can display the translation on screen.

Gracias a todos por estar aquí y hacer oír sus voces.

Queremos escucharlos, valoramos a todos los miembros de nuestra comunidad.

Si desean hablar ante el consejo in español, pueden hacerlo.

Reynen La Tarjeta Amaria, que se encuentran en la mesa a su esquierda y entrenguenla a Abre Manier.

We have zero people uh registered to speak virtually, and the deadline to register has now passed.

If you are unable to sign up to speak prior to the deadline, you are always welcome to email your comments to the city council at any time of day.

This is called public comment because it's time dedicated for you to inform the city council about your views.

Comments will be limited to three minutes.

And before we start uh on public comments, I just want to let you know that um there was some federal agency action today in the city of Hillsborough, uh, and it was uh DEA action.

And I just you know, if you if you're here to speak on that, the DEA put out a statement, and it said that today the DEA Portland District Office served two federal narcotics warrants in Hillsborough, Oregon, uh resulting in arrests, and apparently they seized uh 3.8 kilos of methamphetamine.

So if you're here to speak on that, you of course can still do that, but I just wanted to acknowledge that we are aware that DEA was operating uh here today.

All right, uh, so we'll begin hearing from Denise Van Domlin and Brown Wildfire.

So please come up and Denise, you can take one area, one desk and Brown Wildfire.

You can take the other desk.

And as a reminder, you have three minutes to speak.

Uh and Denise, you can go first and just press that center button until the microphone turns green.

When the microphone is green, then we can all hear you, and the people on Zoom can hear you as well.

And your timer is up there.

Thanks so much.

Good evening, Mayor Pace and Council.

Good to see you all again.

I would like to ask you to please allow item 5.2 regarding my request for the new street name exceptions on the Van Domlern Acres Subdivision to please be postponed and added into the next council meeting May 5th agenda.

I only recently was made aware of this new staff recommended action on your memo for you to consider after calling in for an update.

Since I was told I would be kept informed upon the staff last minute, unexpectedly withdrawing the item in the February 17th council meeting, since I didn't understand why and what was happening all of a sudden.

As a result, I am needing more time, please to evaluate and get more information by speaking with staff with questions to fully understand in order to adequately be prepared upon presenting to council.

Simone has kindly squeezed me in to speak briefly between her appointments yesterday and this afternoon, which I greatly appreciate.

But there are still questions and clarifications I have to be addressed and discussed further.

Thank you for your understanding.

Thank you.

So we were talking about breaking Brown and developing a new police station instead of funding program for the working class.

And the state believes that can or doesn't do anything to interfere with I think of the law.

They sound like the kind of people to defend enslaving black people back in the day because it was legal, or they seem like the kind of people to get mad for racial marriage because it was illegal.

I always point out don't reduce crime, and we have the studies, the evidence to show that.

Well, I was already there.

Uh they don't reduce crime.

You want to reduce crime?

You gotta advocate and fight for better funding for the district.

You gotta meet people's needs.

I always tell you, like last time they cut 20 million from the Hillsborough School District because so many people from Nike and Intel are leaving because they're constantly being laid off.

And then y'all are here saying we want to help the local economy while giving billions in tax cuts to Intel and Nike who again are constantly laying people off.

We stand with the missing and murdered indigenous people.

What about the missing people from here in Oregon?

As a descendant from the local me, I stand with my indigenous cousins, but I do not stand with any of these so-called leaders that have done nothing to defend us, to protect us.

And I pointed out last time.

They will never be the ones to challenge the system.

They will never take that step.

They will rely on the people to do it and organize until it's co-optable for them to look better for their PR.

I am here to remind everyone, as I've always trying to remind you that they don't matter.

They are useless.

They are not gonna help us out of this.

We are.

We know what's going to be done.

They're so disconnected.

They were telling us at one of the meetings that we need new data centers so that we can upload videos of ice taking our people as if we didn't already know that.

Like, come on.

And as always, y'all are useless.

Thank you.

Actually, no, I'm not.

Next speaker is Elijah Radford and Jacob Roloff.

Eliza Radford and Jacob Roloff, uh, you can come up.

And then on deck, we have Shiloh Lairin or Lorin.

So Elijah, you can go first and just press that center button when the mic turns green.

You have three minutes.

Hello, council.

My name is Elijah Radford, and I have come forward to voice my concern regarding resolution 2916.

I don't believe you have negotiated well with PGE, and if passed, this resolution will continue to let PGE push costs onto the residents of Hillsborough.

The staff report summarizes resolution 2916 as supplemental terms related specifically to vegetation management, relocation, payment provisions, and indemnification with PGE.

I would like to focus on the payment provisions.

The staff report says that PGE pays a franchise fee of 3.5% of their gross revenues generated in the city.

The term franchise fee is going to be replaced with something like right of way usage fee.

And this will generate 17.7 million dollars this year for the city.

This sounds nice until you search around on PGE's website and see their Schedule 750 document, which shows that Schedule 7, aka residential customers, are charged 4.806 cents per kilowatt hour as a quote, franchise fee recovery rate contained in distribution charges, end quote.

So that means when you look at your bill and see a distribution charge of $50, you should realize that 69% of that charge is PGE passing the franchise fee on to the customers or $35, $34 for every $50.

Um, and I believe that this resolution will allow PGE and the city to keep the status quo under the under a new name, if not completely hide the cost they are passing on to the consumer.

If you read the resolution, section six, subsection A states the payment imposed by this subsection shall be considered an operating expense of PGE and shall not be itemized or billed separately to consumers within the city.

The staff report recommends passing this resolution.

The staff also admits that, quote, no outside engagement was conducted.

The supplemental agreement is an agreement between the city and PGE.

End quote.

Why wouldn't the city want to be involved with the people who live in said city?

Maybe because the people in the city would say the franchise slash RWO usage fee rate recovery should be paid by big users like data centers.

Why not push back further against PGE?

This is not an agreement between the city and a grocery store or the city and a McDonald's.

This is an agreement between the city and a monopoly that the consumers who live in that city have to pay.

We have no other option but to use PGE.

And we are not being consulted.

This is a five-year agreement in the middle of the biggest electricity and processing power boom in the history of the world.

I urge you to vote against passing this resolution until the community is given a chance to participate in such a serious matter.

Finally, because of PGE's business model and executive compensation is tied to the expansion of data centers.

At least the city should really like actually recoup the money with a better deal and not just pass the costs on to the consumers and then sell it to us like you raised 17 million dollars from these from PGE.

You didn't.

Thank you.

Next up is Jacob Roloff and Shiloh.

Uh you can come up and take the other seat.

Thank you.

Uh Jacob, just press that center button, and you have three minutes.

Good evening.

Uh, my name is Jacob Roloff.

Uh following Eli's general points, uh, I don't think resolution 2916 should be adopted uh based on the lack of public comment on the deal that was made.

The low rate of 3.5% as a franchise fee on revenue compared to Prineville, which charges 5%.

And Prineville has far fewer data centers as well as a small smaller industrial base.

I think council should definitely pursue a privilege tax, which is an option to get to that 5%.

Uh and the city should attempt to prohibit utilities from recollecting these fees uh from residents.

Um with the flat rate that PGE charges heavy users on top of their regular and recovery rates.

Uh those charges don't seem to bring residential rates down somehow, and uh PGE ends up double dipping for profit.

Residential rates uh raised again just this last uh April 1st.

Uh relatively, this franchise fee uh or right-of-way fee generates a lot of money for the city, but it also relatively raises residential bills and um this uh recovery fee ends up being a significant portion, as Eli mentioned, of the distribution charge on our bills.

Uh over 2,200 people have signed the petition for a data center moratorium in Washington County, and I think the power question is one of the main issues that need to be figured out.

That's why people are so hot about that.

And um certainly if this moratorium becomes some sort of policy.

Uh on the note of data centers and and local funds.

Uh I think last year it was proposed that council look into a computer and peripherals tax, which is modeled after a similar program in Virginia, which yielded 895 million in a single county.

Um I don't think the city should enter into a five-year agreement on these terms without a public hearing and more equitable energy cost distribution.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Uh next up is Shiloh.

Shiloh, um, press that center button there.

Great.

And you have three minutes.

Oh, wait, let us restart.

There you go.

Now you're all set.

I uh hello, Hillsborough City Council, Mayor Pace.

Uh my name is my legal name is Shiloh Loren.

Uh I was born as Charlene and Maria Howling in Federal Way, Washington in 1987.

To an immigrant father who was a military MP who became uh the owner of a grocery store that I worked at from age twelve.

And a white Christian nationalist mother who homeschooled me and did not believe in evolution or let me have any interaction without anybody except for anybody in the church who were sexually assaulting me since the age of four uh and beating me to try and turn me into a woman.

I have a long story, but most recently I came here um against my will after being hate crimed out of Bellingham, Washington.

April 14th, I started speaking to Bellingham City Council, including Mayor Kim Lund, uh, about hopefully making Bellingham, Washington a destination for thousands of queer and transgender people to come to their college in North Washington across the um border from Canada to become a sanctuary city.

Uh I've got to tell you right now, it did not.

Um June 25th, I had a medical emergency.

I am disabled and have been considered too disabled to work since July of 2023 after experiencing uh distressing injuries, which I have yet to recover from.

I tried to go to Peace Cell Health, St.

Joe's Hospital, which is run by a religious organization, as is all medical organizations in Whatcom County.

Um June 25th with two witnesses from the organization, Trans Survival.

I was advocating for Trans Sanctuary City with in Bellingham, Washington.

I was turned away by the hospital and promptly arrested arrested by police, assaulted and beaten and placed in restraints for over six hours before they even knew why I was there or my name.

Then on August 10th, my roommate who had been stalking me, who have vicious, cruel woman who said she was a child a child of God, called the police on me, and I was put in jail and thrown out of my home and separated from my companion animal and had every single thing that I had built and made as uh including um computers with evidence of white supremacist uh movements and um uh activists all around the country trying to escape transphobia.

I have been homeless without a stove, without my companion animal and without a fridge for eight months.

PPB stole my car on September 11th and then placed me in inpatient.

I have been an inpatient or or domestically violenced for the last two years.

Um you have three minutes and your three minutes is up.

Thank you.

Uh I would like to give you some documentation.

If somebody from your city could get in contact with me, it would be greatly helpful.

Thank you.

Okay.

Um that's all.

Yeah?

Okay.

All right.

Um moving to item four, the consent agenda.

The items on the consent agenda are normally considered in a single motion.

Any item may be removed for a separate consideration upon request by any member of council.

Is there a request to remove any items for separate consideration?

Okay.

Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda?

So moved case.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Second annuary.

Thank you.

Is there any discussion?

Okay.

Maybe please have a roll call.

Councilor Salgado.

I.

Councilor Harris.

Hi.

Councilor Sinclair.

Aye.

Councilor Anbury.

Hi.

Councillor Case?

Aye.

Councilor Alcair.

No.

Okay.

We have a majority.

The motion passes.

Moving to item five or yeah, item 5.1.

Consider finance committee's recommendation to approve the guaranteed maximum price for the construction of the Hillsborough Police Department Headquarters project.

And any necessary change orders, amendments, or appropriation transfers not to exceed the full funding authorization.

Before I ask for a motion on this item, staff will give a presentation.

Mayor, I'm going to actually kick us off on this one tonight for the first few slides.

So Mark, if we can pull up the uh PowerPoint.

Just a little bit of context.

This has been a project that has been uh underway for seven or eight years at this point.

Uh it's been uh council priority for for many years.

Um and we are very excited to be able to bring it to the council tonight uh to get to this point.

Um and our our goal tonight is to get approval from the city council on the guaranteed maximum price, as the mayor mentioned, uh working with uh Swinterton builders.

I'll just wait for the PowerPoint to come up.

For those folks waiting online, we're just having a little bit of tech difficulties, so we're we're on it.

Just hold tight, okay.

Thanks, Mark.

If you go down to the next slide.

So again, our goal tonight uh is to uh get approval for the guarantee maximum price with Swinterton builders in the amount not to exceed 73.4 million.

Mark, if you go to the next slide.

So some context here.

So uh currently, as you're all aware, I know we've had several meetings on this, but just wanted to make the make sure we're uh sharing the context.

So currently there's two precincts with uh with the Hillsborough Peace uh police department.

The first is the West Precinct, which is on 10th Avenue.

Um that was a converted uh grocery store um a couple of decades ago.

It's served as purpose well, but it's been outgrown for several years now.

And the East Precinct is over off of Cornell as well.

So this is actually an opportunity to merge both precincts into the new headquarters, where you can see up on the map, which is just kind of northwest of the of the Hillsborough Airport.

Uh next slide.

So uh the other thing I wanted to chat really quickly about is uh we recognize the importance of that block, specifically in our downtown area and uh along Avenue de Diaz.

And so we, as you all know, have been working with our Avenue de Diaz coordinating committee for about five years now.

We've also talked about this with them because we know that this will impact uh that corridor significantly.

So we appreciate all of their input on this, and we know that as we build this new headquarters and figure out what to do with that block.

We want to make sure that the public understands that we will continue to maintain some type of police presence downtown.

That's an incredibly important, and uh we are exploring many ways to do that.

Uh, you can see here kind of the timeline that we've spent working with them, and we purchased this property back in 2022, and our staff have done a great job working uh through the process to get to this point.

Um kind of shows where this is located again, zoomed in just northwest of the airport.

Uh this has great access from both east west and north south, both on Evergreen and on 25th Avenue.

So, with that, I'm gonna turn the rest of it over to I think uh Chief Coleman is next.

Uh Mark, if you'd advance it one.

Good evening, Mayor, Council members.

Thank you for having us here tonight.

Uh I'm proud to report to the council that over the last two years, city staff, our our architectural design team at DLR Group, and our pre-construction services team at Swinterton and Timber Lab have leaned directly into these design themes that you see um projected in front of you.

Those themes are equity, operational resilience, operational efficiency and functionality, wellness and human health, and community connectivity.

In sum, these guiding principles have shaped the design of a building that vastly improves the experience of community members who need police services, improves the safety of its occupants over current facilities, and supports the core public safety responsibilities of this of city services.

It provides an atmosphere of calm and professionalism for those who conduct business, hold meetings, and most importantly, seek support in the midst of a crisis.

From the studs, the new headquarters will support rapidly emerging technology and law enforcement.

And over many years, HPD intends to strategically deploy technology that prevents crime, protects infrastructure from criminal activity, accelerates both officer response and investigative outcomes, and which reduces the lethality of critical incidents.

Every current member of the police department has been Chief, if you don't mind.

Mr.

Brown Wildfire, in the last meeting, you interrupted us twice.

If you interrupt us again.

If you interrupt us again, you will be asked to leave.

You are on you are on notice.

All right.

If you interrupt us again, you'll be asked to leave.

Chief, please continue.

Certainly, Mayor.

Every current member of the department has spent the majority of their career in facilities that have met basic needs and um admirably on part of those people that designed it.

However, the utilitarian construction, lack of windows, and placement in a dense urban area with no safety buffer zone, has led to real threats to personal safety and to unhealthy, uh unhealthy mental state, uh, which is comprised of continuous vigilance.

By contrast, the new headquarters will bring the beauty of the Northwest in as a counterbalance to the demanding nature of the work being done.

It features a location with existing natural boundaries, a design with abundant windows, and the extensive use of natural building materials, highlighted primarily by mass timber.

These elements will combine to make safety and security both physically tangible and psychologically reassuring at the same time for all people who use work and have need of the facility.

The planned use of timber as a primary structural component with its regional availability and processing infrastructure has in many ways become the cornerstone of this process and the key design themes by reducing building weight overall, meeting seismic resiliency standards, naturalizing the aesthetics of the building.

Thank you.

The last use of uh the the planned use of timber as a primary structural component with its regional availability and processing infrastructure, has in many ways become the cornerstone of the key design themes that I'm touching on right now.

By reducing building weight, meeting seismic resiliency standards, naturalizing aesthetics, and contributing to the cost consciousness measures.

The themes that have truly centered where we are today are those themes of truly center where we are today, and we believe this project will be uniquely Hirlsboro, and it will be a point of civic pride.

Thank you, Chief.

Next slide.

And Sean, before you speak, could you identify yourself for the record?

Yes.

Thanks.

Good evening, Council Mayor Pace.

I'm Sean Morrison, Hillsboro Public Works.

I'm responsible for the project delivery side of this.

I'm gonna walk you through some uh exciting renderings of the facility that we're going to start building this summer.

Um here um there's a view looking southeast from the natural area.

Uh up front, you can see the public plaza.

Um, and behind that um the one stair, the one story portion of the facility there is the community room, and then the rest of the facility behind that.

Next slide, please.

Uh next here is the main entry plaza on the public side of the facility.

Um down the corridor, you can see the actual main entrance on your right side is another shot into the community room.

Um here we've got some uh landscaping and flat work that's been uh positioned to enhance the the security, the secure feeling of the of the plaza here.

Next slide.

Here's another look at the public outdoor area.

Um there'll probably be some seating out here and an area for the public to flow out uh between here and the uh community room that you are looking into.

Next slide.

Here are some uh uh renderings of the interior spaces.

Um the furniture and the paint colors might change, but this is generally the look and feel of the interior spaces here.

Uh break room, uh some of the office area and the community room.

Next slide.

And I'm gonna hand it off to Chief Coleman.

Thank you, Sean.

We just wanted to bring to your attention uh we we uh absolutely went through best efforts to find a cost-effective way to make use of the full parcel, but as many of you know, it is bisected by a wetland and uh floodplain, and it became uh financially unfeasible to develop training and uh large evidence storage capacity on that same site.

So um, with very early analysis, it seems like it would be more feasible uh to do those things at another location.

Uh the reason we need those is that all facilities that the department either is in control of right now or enters into uh user agreements with are uh in the long term very um unstable as far as availability moving into the future.

And the department um and the city would like to secure uh those important areas that you know make us all safer.

Uh, all the training that uh both the department, uh the state, and uh the community members feel that officers are in need of, um, rightfully so.

Uh that needs a place to happen.

That needs a place to um to be delivered and uh to keep the community safe by having the most uh the best trained officers in the state of Oregon.

We also um, as I touched on, we have need for large evidence storage to a uh to a large degree.

We don't control how long we're to keep that evidence.

It's usually dictated to us by the prosecuting authority.

And so um sometimes uh you know, well, all the time vehicles are the primary what primarily makes up this large evidence storage, and we have some vehicles that we have had to hold on to for a couple decades now.

So uh we just wanted to bring to your attention that the site that the headquarters is being built on that will not um financially in a responsible way be able to house these entities, and that'll be an ongoing future project.

We also wanted to bring to attention we do know that we're uh you know moving to a whole new area of the city that um community members are not familiar with uh the police being stationed there, but we have long-standing relationships with the communities that we have serviced in directly where our facilities have been located, and that we have every intention of you know both staying in those communities and making it um convenient for our officers to stay out in those communities rather than having to come back to our police headquarters, which will be in the northern section of the city.

So our friends at the Hillsborough Fire Department have uh built us a space that many of you saw on the grand opening for us to stay out there and about the most extreme uh distance from where the new headquarters is planned.

Uh we will stay in the downtown area.

We have multiple specialty squads like our bike squad, our community community impact team, and our um community engagement officers that this is their primary area of operation.

We want a home base for them so they can stay in the community.

Um we do currently do training at a former public work site on Maple Street, so uh that kind of hits uh the western side of the uh city, and then uh we have secured and from our friends at the family peace center, also new office space where officers can drop in 24-7 and again stay out in the field in that part of the city.

Quick question, Chief.

Just to be clear, the East Center will be at the FPC, the family peace center, and the current East Precinct will be closed.

Yes, Mayor.

Uh, that is not a city-owned property, it's leased, so we will that lease is uh scheduled for um end of life uh in uh succession with moving into the new headquarters.

Thank you.

Okay, uh, so I'm gonna go over to the project schedule here.

Uh Robbie showed you some the timeline of some of the historical work that we've done uh to get to where we are today.

Um so our construction partners, uh Swinterton Builders have received all of the subcontractor bids and put the uh guaranteed maximum price together, uh which you see is uh 73.4 million dollars.

Um we are still doing a little bit of work to continue to bring that price down through value engineering exercise.

Our target is to get it uh closer to 73 million, but uh we've certainly uh we're certainly at our maximum and won't go any higher than that.

Um pending approval tonight, uh next month, uh we're we'll do a small mobilization.

Uh you'll start to see some job trailers and fencing show up on the site.

Uh and then June is really our official groundbreaking month.

Uh we'll start uh the the deep utility work, a lot of the site clearing work, um, have our groundbreaking ceremony, and then uh we'll be doing a lot of the site work throughout the summer uh and then start going vertical, hopefully this fall uh winter.

Um, and then we intend to wrap the project up at the end of next calendar year, uh targeting move in in uh December uh 27 or January 2028.

Here's a high-level breakdown of the funding and the overall budget.

So our funding is uh 95 million, uh, which uh came from the form of bond proceeds and uh strategic investment.

Uh and on the left side is the breakdown of our budget, uh, which also totals 95 million.

Uh so in that 95 million dollar month number, we have our direct construction cost, which is basically the guaranteed maximum price, and then the 21.6 million dollar number is all of our indirect costs, uh, like which would pay for our design permitting fees, um, our land acquisition, um, and then we're also carrying contingency uh on our side of the project.

Sean, if I could interrupt you really quick right there.

I just wanted to call attention um to that last slide really quick.

We often get questions in Hillsborough about why we place such a focus on economic development, and I think it's really important to clarify that this type of project is actually being done without having to raise taxes on our community.

That's really important because most communities in the state of Oregon, in order to build a new facility or a new fire station, new police headquarters, you actually have to go out and get a bond and actually raise people's taxes, and this is being done without having to do that.

So I just wanted to thank um the many councils and the current council and everybody that's actually put us in the situation where we can actually afford this type of a facility without increasing the tax burden on our residents.

Thanks.

Thank you, Robbie.

I appreciate you saying that.

I know that Tigert is um considering a brand new bond to pay for their police headquarters, and so thank you for bringing that up.

So we're here tonight to ask for uh approval of the the GMP that we've presented.

Um we have quite we have time for questions, uh, or we can move on to approval of the agenda item.

Any questions for Sean, the chief, or Robbie?

Okay, thank you so much for the same.

So I'll care.

I have a comment.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

So thanks for the presentation on this project.

And I just want to say I'm encouraged by the space, and that it could be an opportunity for community members to come in and have engagement with the police, learn um about some of these processes, and possibly get updates to um public safety throughout our city.

So I am encouraged, I'm encouraged by that.

Thanks.

Thank you, Councilor O'Care.

Any other questions or comments?

Excellent.

Okay.

Um do I have a motion?

I feel like we need a drum roll because we've been working on this for so long.

Um do I have a motion to approve item 5.1?

So moved case.

Do I have a second?

Second hand very is there any discussion?

Maybe please have a roll call.

Councilor Alcair.

Aye.

Councillor Case.

Aye.

Councillor Anbrie?

Hi.

Councilor Sinclair.

Aye.

Councillor Harris.

I councilor Salgado.

Aye.

The motion passes.

Thank you very much.

Yeah.

Yeah.

All right.

Moving to item 5.2.

Consider declining a community member's request to approve the addition of two new names to the city's asset name database.

And just to be clear, this was commented on by Denise Van Domlin earlier tonight.

So I just wanted to connect that comment with this item.

Do I have a motion?

Councilor Embury, do I have a motion?

Yes.

Yeah, okay.

Do I have a second?

No second.

Second sinclair.

Second Sinclair, okay.

Is there any discussion?

I yeah, thank you.

Yeah.

If I may, sorry.

Please, yes.

Go ahead.

Should have ready to recognize me.

No, it's okay.

Counselor Harris, go ahead.

Um I have a question for City Manager Hammond on this.

Um, so I was looking at resolution 2745, which is the policy on this, and looking at naming uh there's two sections here.

Um one says somewhere in here I'm looking for it, but it says ultimately the city council has the has the authority to name after a person earlier.

It says do you mind moving the mic?

Sorry, yes, sorry.

So it says city council has the has the authority to name after a person.

It also says under naming under individual, sorry, section four.

It says that um where there is an intention to name a city asset after an individual, city staff shall conduct a thorough review into the individual and deem them as an appropriate namesake.

So the question is does the council indicate an intention to name somebody and then refers it to city staff to do an investigation into their into the individual, or do you does the city staff do uh a thorough review into the individual and then give it to city council as part of their decision to name an asset?

Uh councillor Harris, it's a great question.

Um this is the first time something like this has come to the city.

This is a fairly new policy.

Um, and just acknowledging uh what uh the community member had mentioned earlier, we it's certainly an area that we need to improve on.

Um I would suggest that if the council did want to move forward with naming it after an individual, then staff can do that process and make sure there's no concerns.

There's been nothing identified that causes concern specifically about the individual that has come up at this point, so there's not a concern there.

Um for staff, it was more the idea of setting a precedence of naming things after individuals based on community um requests.

That's that's why the recommendation came up to uh decline.

And just so you know, Councilor Harris, previous to this request in front of different councils, we've had requests come up of people asking for us to name alleys or streets after family members.

Um so that that's where this all started.

Yeah, I just want to say that.

I agree, and I'm just thinking the mechanics of this, honestly, is that if our decision is to be informed by a thorough review by city staff, that needs to be done before we make this decision versus we can't make a decision to name it and then give it to city staff.

Um, and there may, but does the city but but then it says you know, if there's an intent to name somebody after, which indicates the city council has taken some indication at least that we would like to name it after somebody, so you're not just always doing reviews for people.

So I'm just considering the the the mechanics, the correct mechanic not just for this, but going forward, because how would how do we do this?

And the fact that it's this is the initial time would be the time to get some clarity on the actual mechanical process of this.

Because for instance, if um the city staff doesn't have to do a thorough review of the individual, then we could make the decision now.

Um, but if they have to do it because that has to be done before we make a decision, that's another issue.

It also says that the city manager then makes the recommendation, and the fact that we have a motion before us declining it, even though it's maybe not specific, your recommendation is not to change not to name it, not to approve this name change.

So I get I get that one, but sort of you know, chicken and egg thing on the review versus the council decision.

Yeah, and I would just add um again, there's probably there are several parts of this policy that just frankly need to be rewritten.

Um it's what it's on our project this right now.

This is a good example because there's some confusion about that process.

Simone, did you want to add anything?

Um, you actually just added so Simone Brooks assistant city manager.

Um, what we have discovered, and I I you may recall from the last community engagement we did when we collected names that what was brought to our attention by a number of community members is that there were a significant number of names that were named after individuals, and so we were asked to take those names back.

Um, obviously, we've had some other things on our plate as a city since that occurred, and so we have not had an opportunity to review those names that already exist.

So that is to um uh city manager Hammond's point.

That is that is still in the works, and so we have not had an opportunity to review this name.

All right, thank you.

And we have had a lot of information on the individual through testimony, pretty in-depth testimony here.

I know that I will acknowledge that that we do have some quite a bit of information.

For me, it was more like I'd like to make sure we have the proper process here so that the public is well informed.

The pending name request as well as future name requests.

That's the only reason I erase that issue.

Okay, any other discussion?

Yes, councillor case and then counselor Ambery.

Um, I think for me, the the concern is that we seem to have changed the rules halfway through.

So there is a street named after uh the the mother, uh, and so the request is also named a street after the father, and then the rules kind of changed in the middle of that.

And so I don't know if we need more time or just more clarity on this change, and the timing is unfortunate, but I would be willing to do a postponement if there's just more clarity we can bring or research that needs to be done.

So land use is not um my area of expertise, but Chad, perhaps you can speak to the Hillsboro Municipal Code issue around the subdivision and how we ended up having to separate those two issues.

Uh sure.

Uh for the record, Chad Jacobs from the city attorney's office.

So the as you know, the city's laws are structured in various ways.

You have the charter, which is sort of like the city's constitution, you have the municipal code, which are ordinances, which are laws, and then you have resolutions which implement the charter and implement the laws.

So what we have when we're just talking about is a resolution, it's sort of the lowest tier that we have.

In addition, we also have provisions of the code, which are outlined in the staff memo that dictate how certain streets are named.

And so that law, an ordinance, preempts any language in a resolution.

So we first have to comply with that ordinance.

The ordinance in question basically dictates that certain streets, north and south streets, have to follow the numbering system, the grid system that we have in Hillsborough.

So even if the council wanted to by resolution say we'd like to name the street after an individual, we couldn't do so without going back and amending the municipal code, because that resolution that you're talking about passing has to be consistent with the city ordinance, which is which is a law.

So one of the issues here is that there's two streets in this proposed subdivision, one of them by law has to be named a number.

So we can't actually name both streets uh using names as opposed to numbers.

Um and so then it becomes the the second question then becomes well, can we name one of the other streets after a person or using beaver, which was the other proposal, and the municipal code also has language in it says that the decision about the actual street name and approval of the street name is vested with the city manager, the authority to do that is given to the city manager.

Now you, as the council can change that, you have every ability to amend the code, and but you'd have to do that by ordinance.

You can't do that via resolution, because again, the resolution has to be consistent with the ordinance.

So what you can do if you want to is you can approve names that go on to the list, and the city maintains a list that Simone was just talking about, and we have a list of eligible street names.

And so when people are want to do a subdivision or other sort of you know plan development where they're gonna name a street, they can pick off that list and say, here's street names that I'd like to use.

The city manager's office then reviews that as part of the process and says, Yes, though those are all eligible.

That street hasn't been taken, it doesn't have to be a number street, you know, all everything is consistent with the code and gives that final approval.

So the council's rule under our current system is that you approve names that go on the list, then the city manager actually approves the actual naming of the street.

And so that's the process we have now.

Again, you're the city council.

If you desire to change that, we can do that.

We just have to change it by ordinance.

We have to go through the legislative process to make that change.

We can't do it just by passing a resolution saying we want to name the street, you know, Chad Jacobs Street, for example.

Not that I'm lobbying for anything, but you know.

Sure.

Okay.

Thanks, Chad.

And then uh counselor Embry.

Yes, thank you.

Uh yeah.

Um I have a comment and then a suggestion.

Um, so yes, this you know, this is a new process for us, and uh timing has been unfortunate for for this.

I would like to suggest a way forward, um, which would be if we could um uh suggest that beaver be put in that list for future consideration.

I understand that um the current subdivision timing doesn't allow that, but if we could put Beaver in that list, uh then in the future it might be selected for a name uh for a street name.

So that that's my uh suggestion.

I do want to just to clarify, please so that there isn't confusion.

Um that we just don't have a timeline for when a name would be considered.

Um so I just want to be clear that be just that could take three months, it could take five months, and so the we're unclear about what the deadline is.

So I just want to make sure that that's clear.

And so what you're saying, Simon, correct me if I'm wrong, is that even if we get the name on the list, that name could not necessarily be ascribed to the street that the person is asking it to be ascribed to.

If I understand, Councilor Annbury, she's asking us to add it to kind of a list outside of the list that's with these other individual names and names that were not approved and go through the review process, and we don't have a timeline for that review process before coming back to council with a list of names for you to review.

Sorry, look becomes a little circular.

Okay, great.

All right, counselor Sergato.

Yeah, what is the timeline look like on needing to name this street?

Right?

How much time do we have to figure this out?

That is an excellent question.

Unfortunately, the person I need in the office is actually out until Monday to clarify there's a developer timeline and then there's a city timeline, and I won't know the difference between those two timelines until Monday.

Okay, well, I'd like to suggest we just postpone it until we get that information.

Yes, I second that.

Okay, well, um yeah, we already have a motion going on, right?

No, it's okay.

I appreciate y'all speaking up.

So we have a mo so backing up a little bit.

Um, we were considering the declination of a community members' request to approve the addition of two new names to the city asset name database.

We had a motion and a second.

Um, and then we had a discussion.

Good job.

And then uh we're gonna have a roll call, and we have to move forward to that roll call unless somebody pulls their motion back.

Is that correct, Chad?

Correct.

Yeah, okay.

So the people who actually made the motion, if you would like to rescind those motions, you can do that.

I'm gonna pause here.

Okay.

So I'm gonna move forward with a roll call.

May you please have a roll call.

Councilor Alcair.

Sorry, no.

Councilor Case, no.

Councilor Anbury.

Hi.

Councilor Sinclair, no councillor Harris.

Hi.

Councilor Salgado.

No.

Okay.

Um we need a majority to uh have this motion pass, and we do not have it.

So um the motion does not pass.

Yeah, yeah.

Make the second yeah, so it say again.

Uh uh, Council Sergado, do you want to make the second motion?

The motion you were gonna make of postponing.

Is that what's oh yeah?

Uh you move to postpone the decision on this until we figure out what the timeline looks like.

Okay, naming the street.

Can I get a second on that?

Sinclair second.

All right.

So we have a motion to postpone the decision, and we have a second on that.

Is there any discussion?

Yes, this is out here.

I want to have a discussion.

I think it's important if we're gonna go forward with a process that we can figure something out where it involves community engagement.

So maybe we need to create a committee or an advisory group to be able to talk with us, and that we're not the city isn't making decisions about street names on their own.

Okay, any other comments.

Uh sorry, two comments.

Go ahead, Councillor Harris.

I think we have a straightening naming process uh that involves the community.

Uh but also postponing the decision, but we've made a decision on this.

Um I guess can we move to revisit it or how to Chad, how would we go about doing this?

Because it sounds like we made a decision on this particular matter.

So would that be a reconsideration for two weeks, or what would we do?

So as I understand that the issue before the council is a request to add two names, Wally and Beaver to the street name list.

Um that decision has not been made.

So staff recommended declining that offer.

Um there was a motion on that which just failed.

Now there's a motion to postpone the the request decision on the request um until staff as I understand the motion until staff has had time to review the name Wally to determine whether or not it should go on the list and provide you with information.

So they have not been declined, so they're still potentially pending and no decision is being made on them at this point.

Correct.

Got it.

Thank you.

Yeah, the just a clarifying motion was to figure out the timeline of when we need to name the street before we make the decision.

Okay.

Yep.

So not for staff to do the research on Wally, but just to come back with a timeline on when the street needs to be named.

So that we can decide how to proceed with it because we need to figure out how much time we have to figure it out because that could determine what what the conversation looks like.

Great.

Thank you for that clarification.

Okay.

Uh may I please have a roll call councillor salgado?

Aye.

Councilor Harris?

I.

Councilor Sinclair.

Aye.

Counselor Anvery.

Aye.

Counselor Case.

Councillor Alcair.

Aye.

Okay, so that motion passes to pause until we get more further information.

Okay, thank you very much.

Moving to item 5.3, consider uh, and thank you, uh, assistant city manager Simone Brooks.

Um moving to item 5.3, consider finance committee's recommendation to adopt a resolution granting Portland General Electric a subs a supplemental franchise agreement.

Resolution number two nine one six is available.

Do I have a motion to adopt resolution number two nine one six?

So move, Sinclair.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Salgato seconds.

Oh, sorry.

Salgato seconds.

Okay, any discussion?

Yes.

Okay, Councilor Sinclair.

I would like to ask that we move this agenda item to May 5th, uh, so that we can further engage with the public and dive deeper into understanding what the uh three per uh 3.5 percent fee as an operation expense that cannot be itemized, uh, to further understand why that's not itemized, um, so that the public has clear understanding of uh rates as they expand due to infrastructure expansion, and to further understand uh the agreement itself of author uh of it not authorizing or conditioning any new infrastructure investments.

So I like to recommend that we move it to May 5th.

So counselor Sinclair, you made a motion to approve this.

No, I to go forward, made a motion to go forward so we could have discussion.

I I I thought you made a motion to yes, no, who made the motions?

I made the motion to go move forward.

We have to have that to have discussion.

I I seconded thinking that you were making the motion to approve that.

Yeah, so I'll pull back my second then.

Yes, so I I'm gonna I'm gonna say this again.

Okay.

So before us was finance committee's recommendation to adopt a resolution granting PGE a supplemental fan franchise agreement, resolution number two nine one six, and you made the motion to move forward with that.

And then counselor Solgato seconded that.

Yeah.

To bring it on the table because now we'll have discussion and we have discussion after the motion.

Yeah, that's great.

Okay.

I I was just confused that you made a motion to move forward, and now you're saying to to not.

Oh, I see what you're saying.

Do you know what I'm saying?

It's confusing to me.

Yes, I understand what you're saying, but I would like this council to consider taking this off of the agenda.

Mayor.

And I know it I that's confusing the process.

Because you're saying let's go, and then you're saying let's not go.

No, I'm saying let's go forward with discussion.

And so if I have done this wrong, then your your motion is there.

Um and we have a second on it.

I um if I was seconding thinking that she was approving it.

Approving it.

So I don't I want to pull back my second mayor.

Yes.

If I could interrupt, please.

I think the easiest path forward here is to allow Council Sinclair to rescind her motion.

Yeah, I'm thinking that make a new motion to postpone this item to May 5th.

And then she can see if there's a second for that.

And if there is, then you can have a discussion about that motion.

Okay.

So let's go in order.

Counselor Sogato, are you rescinding your second?

Yes.

Okay.

Councillor Sinclair, are you rescinding your motion?

Yes.

Okay.

Um, but before this council was consider finance committee's recommendation to adopt a resolution granting Portland General Electric Supplementary Franchise Agreement resolution number 2916 is available.

Is there any motion for that?

Solgato motions to approve.

Okay, so Gato Second case.

Okay, so we have a motion from Councillor Sogato.

Counselor Case is seconded.

Is there any discussion?

I think that um councillor Alcair.

I think that we are not being transparent enough about this.

Um our city staff understand this.

We have been given information about this, but I don't know if the general public understands this.

I know that we have given out information, but I think this is a pretty significant um vote that I think should involve more public engagement.

So I agree with postponing it, and I am hopeful that there's gonna be some effort to try to get um community members more involved in this vote.

Thanks.

Thank you, Councilor O'Kerr.

Is there any other discussion?

Yes, Councilor Sogato.

So just to be clear, I made a motion to approve, and then we have a second, and now we're discussing that the vote.

Right.

So just want to say a couple of things.

So I I have tried to dig into understanding the business model of investor owned utilities.

It's very complicated, very complex.

Way out of my area of expertise.

So this is an area that I really rely on the expertise of our staff to really inform us.

And I I really do have a lot of confidence in what I'm reading.

I reviewed the documents, nothing really stands out as a red flag.

I've heard the concerns.

Uh, this is why I choose to move forward in approving this contract.

Thank you, Counselor Solgato.

Are there any other comments?

I think from that.

Sorry, yes, Councilor Case.

Sorry.

Um, you know, we talked about this with the finance committee last week.

Um, and you know, this is we're we currently are and Andrew, correct me when I'm wrong here, which will happen pretty soon.

It's um, but we have a three and a half percent three, we've been running without a contract with them.

Um and so can we talk about the issue if we don't have a contract?

Let's start there.

Yeah, I could kind of really quickly provide a little summary.

Andrew Bartlett, um, C Manager's office for the record.

So the city uh back about a decade ago transitioned away from negotiated franchise agreements to a license-based system to manage our right-of-way.

Um in that ordinance, what we did do was kind of reserve city council's ability to grant franchise agreements.

Um but the intent was really for those to kind of clarify and enhance terms that maybe aren't addressed, or that the utility can't work under in our code.

Uh and PG has requested that we that we consider a supplemental franchise agreement, which is what's in front of you tonight.

Uh as far as the the fee goes, this this franchise agreement and our code and license system really just kind of um set terms for the relationship between the city and the utility and how they operate in the right of way.

The city doesn't have any rate authority over PGE.

Um so is we as we talk about the three and a half percent franchise fee, that is really something that is built into the into PG's rate case that is uh discussed at the Oregon Public Utilities Commission.

What this what this uh supplemental agreement does is the the language that is in the agreement around the right-of-way fee or or franchise fee and privilege tax, I believe is is directly pulled from PG's previous franchise agreement, and it just kind of it outlines that PG will pay for its use of the right of way.

Um and it also reserves the city's ability to uh administer or pass a privilege tax against the utility.

Uh I think the reason that we wanted to include this language in the supplemental agreement why PG requested that is most utilities pay in arrears, so they pay us quarterly, and it's based on the business activity that they have done in the previous uh calendar quarter.

Going back historically, PG's had a number of franchise agreements with the city.

And as far back as I could find records of, PG is always paying in advance, and that payment in advance is based on the prior year's gross revenue.

So they wanted to recognize that in this in the supplemental agreement, uh just you know, because they didn't want to end up switching to paying in arrears, and it would kind of be an accounting mess where we'd have we'd we'd basically have to forego a year of revenue from PG, which um, you know, and discussing that with finance committee wasn't really something the city was in a position to do.

So that's that's um kind of what what's in this as far as the is the right-of-way fee payment or I guess franchise fee payment in this case.

If I could add as well, just to a really important clarification here, the three and a half percent that we're talking about is the same three and a half percent that we've had for decades on the books.

This is not a new fee.

This is uh it's kind of the base.

Uh I think almost every city within uh Oregon or or in PGE's area, that's the base.

That's what everybody charges.

There are some cities that charge more than that.

So you'll see, I think in um staff report and other other places you see that it it some cities charge as high as five.

Um, just a warning of that that if we were to raise that, that impacts everybody, right?

And so that's why we've always kept it at 3.5% as opposed to some of our neighboring cities that have gone up to 5%.

And so that's why the 3.5% is it there's no change.

Um, we're not recommending a change.

This is just um putting into the new supplemental agreement, as Andrew mentioned.

Really, it's in there because of how it's it's when they pay us.

It's not anything to do with the actual rates.

Thank you, Robbie.

Thank you, Andrew.

Um, Counselor Solgato and then Counselor Sinclair.

Oh, my bad, I forgot to turn it on.

Okay, Counselor Sinclair.

Yeah.

I I think what myself or even we we see testimonies today also.

I think the concern is in the era of AI, there's expansion that is potential in the future, and we don't know what those expansions are.

And this is not itemized on our residents' utility bills, so they can't people are on fixed incomes, people are having a hard time making things meet, everything's going up.

And so when we see we just had a 5% increase, and correct me if I'm wrong, this still has the 3.5% baked in, even though we went for almost two years without an agreement, correct?

Yeah, that's correct.

The the previous franchise agreement did have a provision that continued payment of the franchise fee if the agreement went into a into a state of kind of being expired, which it did.

Right.

And so I still again am going to ask that we uh go forward in taking this off the agenda and moving it forward for deeper discussion with the public.

Um because there are and we are in a transitional era due to AI, and res it may not look the way it used to look with uh utilities, even though this is something we've done for many years.

What are the guarantees of this not shifting and inadvertently having cost indirectly be paid by our residents?

Okay.

Oh, did you have an answer, Andrew?

Did you want to?

It's a little again, it's I don't know that this is the mechanism to kind of you know flesh out what those costs are.

Again, that that's more a function of the of the PUC.

This is really kind of providing protections for the city to ensure that PG is doing work in accordance with what our code says.

Um, it doesn't commit PG to any infrastructure expansions or it doesn't require them to uh provide us with a list of all their upcoming projects.

This is really just kind of outlining the process in which they'll operate within the city, so making sure that we have protections like um you know, them getting permits before they do work, uh, them relocating when the city has projects, those sort of pieces.

Um, so it's it's really just more our our working relationship and and kind of formalizing that.

But um to your point, yes, you know, we can we can certainly bring this back and have more discussion if needed around this item.

Counselor, um, I wonder if I could just add a little more clarity to what Andrew mentioned.

The action in front of you today is just mem memorializing the way we work with PG and our right-of-way, and those terms are in here.

Um, the discussion around whether we should be charging more or should we be charging different classes of customers and all that, that is something we can have later.

I would just caution on not taking action on on this specific franchise agreement, because there is a risk of not having these terms identified.

And granted, it's a risk we've lived with for for a little bit of time, but that doesn't preclude us.

Adopting this does not preclude us from having that second conversation.

In fact, it provides some more clarity on things like the privilege tax, which allows us to then say, okay, we've adopted something in this franchise agreement that says we can um just reiterating that we can impose a friend uh privilege tax.

So when we do that in the future, this is just strengthening that language.

Umgato.

I'm glad you mentioned the privilege tax because I was gonna ask about that.

What does that look like for us?

What triggers it?

What are things that is it triggered by the council, by staff, is it economic indicators?

Um it's a decision by council, and that's again this uh this just points that out even more firmer because we're allowed to do that based on Oregon law.

So this again just reiterates that we can do that.

There are just certain terms that we're agreeing to with PGE.

So for example, if we do implement one, and that's the council's decision, we have to give them 90 days notice.

So that's just again for them to be able to implement that on their bills.

But that can be a future discussion should you choose to do that.

And again, we can implement that after this.

Yeah, okay, great.

Uh counselor Harris.

Thank you.

Just a couple of questions.

I noticed in the staff report it talks about how under HMC 9.48, the city is converting to right-of-way licenses rather than franchise fees.

PG is the last price franchise fee, but then you talk about this will be a new franchise agreement.

Is that just a jargon issue for me, or am I understanding that?

Are we still going to be doing franchises, not right-of-way licenses?

We have every utility except for PG has now come into the right-of-way license system.

Um I would say that the reference to franchises still will probably exist.

It's just, you know, historically, what what agreements between utilities and cities have been called.

Um, and it's really hard to kind of break the habit of calling things a franchise fee.

I guess technically it would be a right-of-way usage fee going forward.

So that's that's what we're talking about.

Yeah, it's not they're not being treated differently than the other.

No, they functionally would be the same.

The label is would be different.

Okay.

And am I correct?

Maybe just to provide more clarity for the entire council.

PGE will also be submitting a right-of-way use license.

And this is a supplemental franchise agreement that accompanies the license.

I just wanted to make sure that this was actually a right-of-way license.

We're changing to that, not a franchise.

And it sounds like that is correct.

We would just use the older nomenclature for this particular report.

Is that accurate?

Yes, that's accurate.

So if I can just jump in, I'm sorry, Andrew.

It's it's not 100% accurate.

I just want to reiterate what Raheem just said.

So everyone, including PG and E will have a license under 9.48.

9.48 allows the city and a utility to say there's certain provisions of 9.48 that don't really work for the type of utility that we have or the type of situation that we're in.

So we can supplement the code language in 9.48 with a supplemental franchise.

So what's before you is a supplement to 9.48 that just says here's some unique terms that only apply to PGE because the way the code is written just doesn't work for PGE.

Specifically, for example, with the with the franchise fee, because the way it's been calculated all these years, the city didn't want to go a year without getting a franchise fee payment.

So we have that language that's different for PGE than is for everyone else under the code.

So they are they will be they will be applying for will be granted a right-of-way license under the code, and in addition, this supplemental is actually described as a franchise agreement.

Yeah, you have supplemental franchise agreement that just supplements the language in the code.

All right, I got it.

That's not confusing.

And the other thing is I'm assuming that if we raise this rate from 3.5 to higher rate, that number would be used by PG for their rate setting in the future, and that would simply largely be passed on to the provider or the customers.

My Chad, jump in if I get this wrong, but they would not use any rate above 3.5% in their rate setting.

Anything that the council elected to do above the 3.5% would be passed through directly as an itemized line item on bills.

Correct.

That's what I'm saying.

Anything we we did would be passed through legally.

They could legally pass this through to the customer, which would in effect be a flat rate increase on everybody in Hillsborough.

Yeah, exactly.

Sorry, I thought you meant in their rate case.

But yeah, you were correct.

Thank you.

Counselor Sinclair.

A question I have is more than anything, it is understanding.

I want the public to be able to understand when they easily look on their utility bills that there's an item line, and they can see if there's a franchise fee or would it be called a Hillsboro licensing fee.

We could probably work with the utility on the verbiage, but yeah, it's usually it's it's framed as the city license tax, city license fee, something along those those lines.

It might say city privilege tax in this case, if we were to take action.

Yeah, and to clarify that my understanding is when other cities that, for example, that have gone up to five percent, that additional 1.5% has to be called out on the bill.

We don't do that.

And so it's not called called out for Hillsborough customers.

A 3.5% is is baked into the base rate the PGE charges.

And so that's that's a state uh that uh the the public utilities commission.

If we if we as a city decided to charge more, then it would be called a privilege tax.

It would be specifically spelled out on the uh PGE bill for customers.

So we we don't know how we're approaching that.

It is gonna so that's we have to say yes first to this with the with the licensing agreement to further talk about the privilege.

No, um that's a completely separate conversation.

What's before you tonight has nothing to do with the rates.

Um if the council ever wants to talk about a privilege tax, then we would have a completely different conversation about that.

That's what that's not what tonight is.

The 3.5% has been in there for decades.

There's no change that we're not recording, there's no change that's being made to that.

It's just in there because that's what is included in the rate already.

Any changes the council wants to make would be have to have to be done in the future separate from this.

Councillor Sinclair, and we have council go ahead.

Uh one of the things you mentioned about was making sure the customers knew what we were doing today.

I think that could be done as a follow-up based on the post-council action about what did we actually adopt versus not.

Um, just to provide more clarity on the action we're taking today, which is again back to Robbie's point that we're just continuing to charge the same franchise fee to PGE, and we can let the public know that if we ever do get into a conversation about increasing the franchise, adding a privilege tax would that which would then increase that total fee, that could be a more robust community engagement process um because then we are increasing fees.

Counselor Embry.

Yes, I had a question.

Um so uh clarification.

So uh if in the future we decide we want to uh uh uh set a privilege tax because right now we don't have one, um, you are saying that that will directly go to our residents, like PGA would pass it just directly.

Okay, so three to so the 3.5% they don't pass, but anything above the pass directly?

Yeah, the so the 3.5% is just built into their bait base rate case, and the PUC kind of recognizes that as just a normal operating expense for the utility.

Okay.

Yeah, okay.

And if we were going to go and we can go up to five because of the what the commission has said.

Yeah, up to five.

I believe um there's been a few cities that haven't done the full one and a half percent.

Some have done, you know, fractional percentages to fund certain certain programmatic elements that they want to take on.

But you can yes, up to five is is what we could do, but we don't have to go all the way to correct, correct.

Yes, yes, yes.

Okay, all right, thank you.

Counselor Solgado.

Uh I think you just answered my question.

So uh privilege taxes are just normal part of the franchise agreements, or is this new?

Um privilege tax would be in addition to the franchise agreement.

So that'd be a separate action.

So the the privilege tax is part of it's baked into the agreement.

So my question is no?

Okay, so there's a that's there's a point of clarification for this.

Yeah, privilege tax is is nothing to do with what we're talking about today.

Okay.

We're not talking about rates, we're not talking about make making any increases.

Um the city council has that ability if at some point you want to, for example, the city of Beaverton has a they they've gone up to five percent.

It's an additional one point five percent privilege tax.

That is not what we're talking about today.

Ours is the 3.5% that every city has, it's within the PGE um service area.

Um that's been the same for for again decades.

There's no change to that.

The only reason the privilege tax came up is someone asked a question about it.

But we are there's nothing in this that would preclude the council from eventually doing a privilege tax or uh anything along those lines.

So the privilege tax is a tool that the state allows the cities to use.

Correct.

Okay.

Yeah, it's a good thing.

It's something that the city could do if you chose to do it.

That's not what we're talking about tonight.

There's no privilege tax that is being considered right now.

Yeah.

Counselor Case.

Um yeah, I just want to uh apologize.

I had had this conversation with staff from during the finance committee, uh, and due to the extensive packet uh this week, um, I neglected to request that my questions and the staff feedback be shared um with council before the meeting for this particular item.

So I'm sorry, because yes, this is just about that 3.5% um and zero interest in doing anything beyond the bare minimum um there.

So I'm sorry, because yes, this is just about that 3.5 percent and zero interest in doing anything beyond the bare minimum there, so and raising any more anything uh then we need to.

So uh maybe uh as a follow-up to this, we could pass those notes along to staff to make sure that or to council so that you can see um that conversation, those numbers.

So apologies for that confusion that great some of us got.

Counselor Sinclair.

Um the last question I had: why did we go for almost two years without having agreement if this is business as usual um yeah, uh you know it it's not ideal, obviously.

Um part of it is this is the first time we've received a request for a supplemental agreement from a utility, so we didn't have a process really laid out to to grant it.

Um when PG initially had requested this supplemental agreement, it was was pretty close to the expiration of their existing agreement, so um that added a little bit of delay, just kind of figuring out how we would move forward with their request.

Um, and then we we entered into negotiation.

So what you have before you tonight is is much more um limited in terms than what was initially proposed.

Uh and then I'd say the other factor in addition to just kind of the normal negotiation timelines is there there was change over a staff that um kind of slowed down the process on this.

So there's just kind of a you know, a couple of different combinations of items that that cause delays and in getting an agreement to a place where staff felt ready to bring it to council okay.

You good okay, all right.

So um just to review, we're on item 5.3.

Um considering finance committee's recommendation to adopt a resolution granting PGE or supplemental franchise agreement, and this is resolution number 2916.

We had a motion, we have a second, and we've had a discussion.

May I please have a roll call counselor alcair?

I agree, yes, provided that we're not raising interest rates and that we have opportunity to talk and engage with public counselor case aye, counselor Ambry.

Aye, counselor sinclair.

I'm abstaining.

I'd like further conversation, the public to be further engaged on this item counselor Harris.

Aye, Councilor Salgado, aye resolution number two nine one six is adopted, moving to item 5.4, zone change 001-26.

Consider adopting an order, excuse me, uh zone change 001-26 Hall.

Consider adopting an order for an owner-initiated zone change from R7 to MR1 on a lot approximately 0.21 acres in size.

Order number 32 is available.

Do I have a motion to adopt order number 32?

Here are so moves.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Second case.

Is there any discussion?

May I please have a roll call?

Councilor Ambry.

Hi.

Counselor Salgado.

Aye.

Counselor Sinclair.

Aye.

Counselor Alcair.

Aye.

Councilor Case.

Aye.

Counselor Harris.

Aye.

Thank you.

The motion is adopted.

Excuse me, order number 32 is adopted.

Uh moving to item 7, ordinances first reading 7.1.

Hillsboro Comprehensive Plan Amendment 001-26 TSP update.

Consider the planning commission's recommendation to adopt an ordinance approving a Hillsborough Comprehensive Plan amendment to incorporate updates to the transportation systems plan.

Ordinance number 6515 is available.

Do I have a motion to approve the first reading of ordinance number 6515?

Harrison.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Second case.

Is there any discussion?

May I please give a roll call?

Counselor Harris.

Hi.

Counselor Salgado.

Aye.

Counselor Case.

Aye.

Counselor Alcair.

Hi.

Counselor Sinclair.

Aye.

Counselor Ambury.

Hi.

Thank you.

The first reading of ordinance number six five one five passes.

The second reading and consideration of final adoption of the ordinance will be May 5th.

Moving to item 7.2.

Annexation of Sohai Central Risewell Homes.

Consider adopting, excuse me, consider approving an ordinance for an annexation of six parcels, approximately 45.88 in size into the city limits with the zone change.

Ordinance number 6512 is available.

Do I have a motion to adopt ordinance 6512?

Harrison Motion.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Second case.

Thank you.

Is there any discussion?

May I please have a roll call.

Councilor Sinclair.

Aye.

Councilor Alcair.

Aye.

Councillor Harris.

Aye.

Counselor Case.

Aye.

Counselor Ambury.

Aye.

Counselor Salgato.

Aye.

Thank you.

Ordinance number six five one two is adopted.

We're going to move on to public hearings.

Um item 8.1.

However, uh, because we've been going for an hour and a half, we're going to take a 10-minute break and we'll become back at 8 40 to start on item 8.1.

Thank you very much.

So we'll recess for 10 minutes and come back at 8 40.

The recording has stopped.

For your patience, we're going to continue on with uh item 8, public hearings.

Specifically item 8.1, appeal 002-25, Saint John the Baptist Church.

Consider the planning commission's approval of case file number CU-006-24.

St.

John the Baptist Church and the appeal from the appellant who is also the applicant requesting the decision to be overturned.

Item number 34 is available.

We'll now move into the public hearing.

If you are here in person and wish to receive a notice of decision, please provide please provide your contact information on the sign-in sheet in the back of the room.

And Aubrey, the sign-in sheet is there.

It's over there.

Okay, thank you.

Um if you are attending virtually and you wish to receive a notice of decision, please email your contact information to the following email address.

Counsel at Hillsborough-Oregon.gov.

And just so everybody knows, counsel is C-O-U-N-C-I-L.

If you are here in person and wish to provide testimony in support or opposition to this matter, please fill out a blue card and give it to the deputy city recorder right over there, Auburnier.

Uh and be sure to mark if you are speaking in favor of or in opposition to the appeal.

You can also be neutral if you wish.

But if you did not pre-register, please listen.

Uh hang on a second.

Um please fill out the card, whether you're in opposition or not, and then uh we can call on you at the appropriate time.

If you are attending virtually and wish to speak but did not pre-register, please listen for when I call for zoom hands in support and zoom hands in opposition.

I will open the de novo public hearing regarding an appeal on item CU-006-24 St.

John, the Baptist Church.

Counselors, do I have a motion to set the presentation times for the appellant at 15 minutes for the initial presentation and 15 minutes for the rebuttal?

So moved case.

Thank you.

Do I have a second?

Second Harris.

Okay, is there any discussion?

May we have a roll call?

Councilor Salgado.

Aye.

Counselor Sinclair.

Aye.

Counselor Harris.

Aye.

Counselor Case.

Aye.

Counselor Anbury.

Aye.

Counselor Alcair.

Aye.

Okay, thank you.

So what that means is the appellant will have 15 minutes to initial presentation, and then there will be a rebuttal of 15 minutes.

Mark, could you please share the ORS video?

All public testimony and evidence submitted must refer to applicable approval criteria, which are listed in the staff report or other land use regulation or criteria you believe may apply to the decision.

Any testimony or written evidence needs to be specific and detailed.

So the city can understand and respond to each criteria or issue discussed in the testimony.

Failure to raise an issue before the record closes prevents an appeal to the land use board of appeals based on that issue.

Failure by the applicant to raise an issue before the record closes.

Prevents an action for damages in circuit court based on that issue.

All testimony and evidence that addresses the approval criteria will be responded to prior to the closing of the record.

Thank you, Mark.

And just for clarity, um the motion passed.

Uh so again, 15 minutes for the presentation, 15 minutes for rebuttal.

I just want to be clear that the motion passed.

And we are required to show that video before this hearing such as this.

Um we also have just so everybody knows we have city attorney Ashley Dougal, um, who will now provide an overview of the order of events, explain the legal standards, and ask the council about conflicts, ex parte, and bias.

Ashley.

Thank you, Mayor, and good evening.

Ashley DeGill from the City Attorney's Office for the record.

Tonight, council is hearing an appeal of a quasi-judicial land use decision.

Unlike in legislative hearings where personal opinion may come into play, quasi-judicial rulings must be grounded in the relevant code, and if the application meets the code, the council must approve it.

The hearing will proceed as follows.

After the preliminary legal matters, staff will make a presentation followed by the applicant.

Then anyone who wishes to testify will be given the opportunity.

Finally, there will be time for rebuttal by the applicant.

At the end of the public hearing, council will either continue the hearing to a date and time certain, or else close the hearing, conduct deliberations, and reach a final decision on this appeal.

The applicant has the burden of proving that the application is consistent with the City of Hillsborough's community development code, comprehensive plan, and any applicable municipal code provision.

The criteria that must be addressed in this hearing are set forth in the staff report.

As the city council is sitting quasi-judicially, any testimony, argument, or evidence that speakers give us must be directed at these criteria, or at some other criteria in the code or comprehensive plan which you believe should apply to this decision.

Only those who have provided testimony to the city council in person or in writing will have standing to appeal this item to the land use board of appeals.

If you have provided written testimony or previous oral testimony to the commission, you do not need to read your written testimony or repeat previous oral testimony.

Failure to raise an issue accompanied by statements or evidence sufficient to allow the commission and the city council and the parties an opportunity to respond to the issue precludes appeal to the land use board of appeals based on that issue.

Failure of the applicant to raise constitutional or other issues related to proposed conditions of approval with sufficient specificity to allow the city or its designee to respond to the issue precludes an action for damages in circuit court.

So now I will ask members of the council if you have any bias, uh appearance of bias, ex parte contacts, or uh conflicts of interest which you wish to disclose.

Before I ask that, Doe, do any members of the council have any questions about any of those three items that I just mentioned, what those are, or uh generally what you should or should not disclose.

Okay.

Councilor Ambry.

No, I don't have a question.

No questions.

Perfect.

Okay.

So then I'll move on to ask uh do any members of the council wish to declare a potential or actual conflict of interest or bias or have questions about the meaning of these terms.

Seeing seeing none.

Uh, do any members oh do you have one?

Yes, okay.

Okay, counselor Amherst.

Yes.

Uh so uh just uh so uh earlier in the year in January I did uh in a at a social uh gathering ask one of the planning commissioners how they were doing in this case was mentioned.

We had maybe like a 20-second conversation before both of us realize this might come to council and we stopped.

So just kind of wanted to let you know.

Perfect.

And you feel that you can nevertheless reach an impartial decision on this.

I believe so, yes.

Okay, perfect.

And then I would also uh wish to ask do any members of the city council wish to report any site visits or ex parte contacts.

I'm seeing shaking heads, so I will take that as no.

Um we do have someone online, so I want to make sure that they're included.

All right, they still online.

Is Councillor Alcair still in line?

Yes, I'm here.

I have no ex parte contacts.

Thank you.

Perfect, thank you, Mayor.

Does any member of the audience wish to challenge the jurisdiction of the city council to hear this matter or the impartiality or ex parte disclosures of any member of the city council?

Okay, I'm hearing none.

And is there anyone online by any chance who has raised their hand or would wish to indicate their desire to challenge these items?

Seeing none.

Thank you.

That concludes the legal matters.

Thank you, Ashley.

I'll now invite Ruth Klein, our senior planner with the planning division to provide any updates and their presentation.

And just before Ruth starts, um, we'll hear her whole presentation, and then if we have any questions, you'll be able to answer those questions over when her presentation is done.

Thank you.

Good evening, Council.

You have before you an appeal of the Planning Commission's decision for St.

John the Baptist Church.

CU-006-24 is the case file number for this project.

That's so first I want to orient you to where this um site is.

This is a Google Aerial photo because it shows the most recent construction activity that is actually currently occupied now.

Um just east of the Amberglen Park.

Those are four blocks of four and five story apartment buildings.

Just slightly east of that is more um apartment buildings that are slightly lower and have a townhouse design to them.

And then you shift over into a green area that is heavily forested.

And if you see a house roof line that is slightly closer to Walker Road and just north of Arcadia by Alta, which is um identified on that map.

That is the house that is um part of the part of the site plan for the Walker Road church school and cemetery project.

Just for clarity, um, can we have that circle or have Mark you know put his does this have a pointer on it, Mark?

Yeah.

It does.

All right.

Let's see if it's not shall I'm not seeing any laser come out of it.

Oh, okay.

If you could direct Mark where to put the cursor that mouse that you had, can you make it?

Yep, perfect.

Right over that.

Thank you.

The mouse by the house.

Um, and then the um the Bronson Creek corridor, you can see that label down at the southern edge of the aerial.

It continues up through that lighter green corridor all the way out to Walker Road, up to the other side of Walker Road, up towards Magnolia Meadows.

I um my arrow is also not working.

That's okay, but is Mark pointing it out properly?

Oh, you still doing pointing stuff?

Yes, yeah.

All right, is everybody uh pretty comfortable on the aerial and where we're located for the site?

Thank yes, thanks, Mark.

Now we can go back to the other issue of my clicker doesn't work.

Can you maybe make it go forward?

Okay.

Um this location off of Walker Road.

Um, you'll hear testimony tonight about the church's um current location, which is also on Walker Road.

So I just want to make sure that there's um not any confusion there.

There's gonna be um conversation about the site over on Walker Road, which is in Beaverton, roughly across the street from the Nike campus.

Um, but this particular area on Walker Road is um a little around 5.92, six acres in size.

It's in the Amberklin Plan District, which you saw in that previous aerial photo.

There are two zones for that site: urban center office research and urban center research park.

So urban center means an area that has development standards for higher intensity of uses, and also more urban characteristics as far as being pedestrian-oriented, having more multimodal resources.

The urban center research park is down in the southwestern portion of the site where the wetlands are located, and really doesn't have a bearing on this application because that's a non-developable area.

The uses for this is a church that is was approved for 350 attendees, K through 8 school of 70 students, a daycare of 30 children, and a cemetery, which you can see on the southern portion of the site.

That red line that you see on the site plan that bisects through the parking lot was part of a last-minute conversation just prior to the close of the public hearing at the planning commission level.

They revised the location of the cemetery to put it on the southern portion of the site.

It was a topic of a lot of concern by their surrounding neighborhood as far as the visual impact of it.

And the red line there shows that they are going to shift the parking lot 50 feet back from the front property line.

That setback there is a reflection of one of several standards that you're going to see tonight as far as promoting an urban center and an urban environment.

That particular code requirement is encouraging buildings to be up adjacent to the street, not parking lots.

And that's what you're seeing reflected there.

And that northern portion of the site where you can see two trees.

Mark, if you want to circle that, it's right above the word Greek Orthodox Church.

Those are the same two trees on the north side of that elevation there.

Does that make sense to everyone?

Right, next.

That means that there's additional discretion in the review.

Staff level decisions are more checkbox black and white decisions.

And the applicant is requesting that the conditions of approval that were opposed by the imposed by the planning commission be removed.

The applicant can extend that, but it's at their discretion, not at the city's discretion.

So we would either need to make a decision tonight or request an extension from the applicant.

And as we move more through the process, you know, you'll flesh out whether that's needed or not.

So the only reason that this project went to the Planning Commission is they requested four major adjustments to the code language.

These are all adjustments that are specific to the Amberglen plan districts design intentions to create a more intense urban environment.

If they were minor adjustments, they'd get reviewed at the staff level.

Or no adjustments, there would be review at the staff level.

So the four major adjustments that are requested were the primary entrance orientation.

It's oriented to the west rather than onto Walker Road.

The building frontage is not extending along the majority of the site.

The window transparency.

That is a requirement of again an urban design requirement, so that when you have buildings along the front edge of the street, there's windows there for that interaction for pedestrians to create a safe and welcoming environment that encourages pedestrian use.

So for example, you could have one large one-story building that covers the whole site, just hypothetically, or a four-story building that only covers a quarter of the site.

That's kind of how floor area works.

You can either build up or build out.

The code is designed to meet the goals of the community.

And so when a project is proposed that doesn't meet those stated community goals for the Ember Glenn Plan District in particular in this case, the Planning Commission has that balance and discretion of figuring out what would be an appropriate exchange for that.

It's very often more of an art than a science.

It's why they have that level of expertise and why it goes to the public hearing process.

And why our planning commission has that sense of they've seen multiple applications asking for major adjustments and start to get that feel of what is appropriate and in that particular context of whatever major adjustment is being requested.

You may have seen in the original appeal application, it was a few sentences there.

What we've parsed apart from that is that the appellant, who is also the applicant, feels that the planning commission misconstrued the major adjustment criteria.

And then lastly, that the requirement of the trail.

Again, this is a slight assumption because there wasn't a lot of detail there.

Both the request for the requirement for an easement as well as the requirement for the construction improvements are both disproportionate under the Fifth Amendment.

Staff took a quick scan of it, but it arrived late.

So we're not able to provide an in-depth analysis of it.

When they went to the Planning Commission, they proposed these options as their public benefits and argued that these would be sufficient to mitigate for the four major adjustments that they requested.

The architecture of the church, which is which is a Byzantine style building, the tree preservation of the trees that remain on the site, the community services, and the native landscaping.

The Planning Commission heard a lot of testimony over three different meetings regarding this and had an in-depth deliberation about whether or not these constituted public benefits.

So the conversation regarding, I'm going to work from bottom up.

The native landscaping, that's actually already a requirement within the Amber Glen Plan District, and it's not therefore a public benefit.

It's just a code requirement.

The tree preservation did come up as a conversation item, but really didn't get traction once that conversation headed towards what sort of protective easements could be provided for those trees to ensure they weren't removed, as well as there wasn't yet a level of detail as far as whether some trees would survive construction activity.

Community services, there was some discussion as far as the types of community services that a religious organization provides, but it did not get into the depth of discussing what would be above and beyond that would be a public benefit.

This was probably the most in-depth of the discussion points.

It was something where there was a there's conversation about can a building that does have features that are above and beyond what other buildings have.

Can that become a public benefit when it's a privately owned structure?

And the property owner maintains the rights to access that building, alter that building, demolish that building.

From again getting back to that weighing of four major adjustments being requested, what is the appropriate compensation for that for to the public?

There was discussion about the type of trail off-site, could it be constructed on?

What is the type of level of service on the flat surface of the trail?

You know, was it easy to construct that trail?

What were the estimated injury engineering costs?

And then lastly, how can they protect the applicant for any potential cost overruns?

The planning commission was very invested in making sure that because we were only dealing with generalized numbers based on trail construction and not any specific estimate, how to protect the applicant against any cost overruns.

So the trail, it's important when you're thinking this through, think about the on-site trail easement as separate from the on-site trail construction and the off-site trail construction.

The on-site trail easement, uh, staff has made findings that they are proportional, and there is a nexus there to require an easement.

Both of those have caps with reimbursement being established if any if those costs, if there's any sort of cost overruns.

Included information on the estimated pedestrian demand for that area.

It's a estimated demand that is based on the category of a church and a school.

So you have multiple studies that are done across the United States, and those averages of all these different sort of unique situations result in numbers that are used by transportation engineers to give estimates of when what peak hours might be might look like.

This is a conservative estimate because it excludes bicycles, the daycare, the church's midweek services, the future basement conversion anticipated to become more classrooms and office space, as well as off-peak hours, which is for example when there isn't a church service or school isn't in session.

It is gradually moving away from being vehicle focused and moving towards pedestrian and bike focused, but they're still in their infancy, and there's limited amounts of data.

But this is based off of that limited data.

The urban design requirements to make walking along these streets exciting and pleasant.

There's cycle tracks and bicycle lanes at a higher level of development than elsewhere in the city.

And then there's an extensive on-site and on-street and off-street trail network.

As this area matures over time, and you can see that happening from the aerial photo, there's only going to be an increase in pedestrian and bicycle trips through the area.

But that information supplied this afternoon did have some data in it.

So the Planning Commission has the discretion to decide how strictly they are going to interpret the development code regulations.

Only resulting in these two public benefits.

Feels that there is extreme violations as far as constitutionality.

And Ruth, just to be clear, the Goldilocks zone means it's just right.

Is that I'm not trying to make a joke.

I just want to make sure that everybody's I made that up.

Okay.

It works.

So there is legal support and has the planning commission when they're making their decision received legal uh review and input from our city council.

I'm sorry, not our council with an SEL on the end, not councillors.

Um and uh there was uh an agreement that um there this very legally defensible decision and that it was um had both a nexus and proportionality.

So the decision tonight is whether you are going to uphold the planning commission's decision and deliberate as far as whether they applied the community development code.

That's the CDC correctly, that's where these rules originate from.

Um, whether you agree with the discretion that they exercised in accommodating the applicant's design um constraints and design preferences, and whether you agree with the planning commission's decision that these conditions regarding the trail easement and the trail on and off-site construction requirements is legally defensible.

Right now, staff and um the uh staff and council believe that the record does support that decision.

So I am not here on my own tonight.

Um I also have Joseph Oz, he's the principal engineering transport um principal transportation engineer in our transportation planning division and is available if you have any questions regarding um transportation um studies.

And I have Lori DeVaux, who's a project manager with our parks department, who can talk to you about um how trails are typically constructed in the cities and what the norms might be for those, and then Ashley Dougal's already introduced herself as our city council support for tonight.

Excellent.

Thank you, Ruth.

Does council have any questions for staff?

I have one.

Counselor Case.

Um for the for the four adjustments that they requested and the grand floor window transparency request.

How often do churches and religious institutions ask for that request?

Is it is this kind of in line with what we see in other or so there's there's kind of two answers to that.

The first is that um it is a request that would likely have come from the majority of any religious denomination that was to be located in this area.

This zone is not intended for this type of um use, it's intended for higher intensity uses.

Um, so that's why there's the major adjustment language in our code to accommodate these unique circumstances.

Councillor Anvery.

Thank you.

I have a couple questions.

Um the first one is so my understanding is that the SDCs are going to cover the on-site trail construction.

Um to uh right, okay, and the and if there's any extra that that uh our parks department would put okay.

So uh are we uh yeah is uh is the applicant being asked to do the construction, and is that the uh problem because they're not being asked for more money than they would have paid because it's the SDCs.

Um they'll probably be out be able to speak to that the best.

Um, understanding from my communications with them is um there is not a strong desire to have the trail on the property at all.

Um it's not um something that they feel is an amenity.

Um, and then there's also the burden of managing the construction of the trail on site and off-site and they don't want to take on that burden, even if they're reimbursed by it, there's still a project management burden as soon as it's got it.

Um and my other question is uh uh when this land was bought by them, but was were the Amberglen um district standards in place already?

Yes, they had been in place for probably close to a decade.

We also had many conversations with the applicant as far as the um constraints and adjustments that would be needed on this property prior to them purchasing it.

All right.

Thank you.

Counselor Solgato.

Uh do you know how long that site has been empty or under undeveloped?

Um I don't know.

Um there's a single family home there, and I don't know how long it was on the market before it was purchased.

Okay, thanks.

Counselor Harris?

Counselor Harris.

Thank you.

Try and get this closer.

I forgot to do that last time.

Um, did the city give any weight for public benefit to the architecture of the building?

During deliberation, they definitely did.

Um there was one commissioner in particular who felt strongly that even visually, even without any sort of public um protection for that architecture, it's something that was pleasing.

Um, but it was not um sufficient as the only public benefit, and these additional items were needed.

Because I read the uh appellants um letter to us, and it did seem to me under 12.50.920, it does indicate that architecture can uh be a public benefit, it should be considered a public benefit, I believe, or maybe can, maybe it's conditional.

May I respond as well to the the counselor's question?

Is that all right?

Yeah, thank you.

Um so the uh the standards in the code are also discretionary.

So the they set examples of public benefits, uh, but they also are ultimately up to the decision makers' authority to determine whether in the particular context on a case by case basis that makes sense.

Okay and uh oh go ahead.

No, finish, please.

Uh well, as I understand it, in this particular situation, I believe that the planning commission was most concerned with uh the ability to retain the architectural value and integrity of those those elements and ensure that they continue to remain a public benefit.

That actually would have been my follow-up question because if you look at 12.50.920, it does give examples of when they would be there, and it says theaters, but it includes places of assembly.

This would be a place of assembly, wouldn't it?

Correct.

Right.

So we are we are sitting as arbiters of the outcome.

Do we interpret what that law means and do we determine what a public benefit would be based on our based on our code?

Isn't that within our purview at this point?

Yes.

So what I would like to know is so I don't really care what the planning commission says then about that.

That'd be my interpretation that I would apply to my decision making.

My question was about what whether the city gave it any benefit, and so does it not matter what they did in the past?

So this hearing is de novo, so it means that you're permitted to consider the prior deliberations, the entire prior record, uh, but you are able to essentially consider it fresh.

Right, and I'm trying to figure out how what they considered what they weighed is what I'm trying to ask.

Does that make sense?

It does.

So I believe that they weighed the unique uh characteristics of this architecture against the ability of them to be able to retain these uh characteristics for the benefit of the public.

Right.

And my point is the the language in that code gives places of assembly as examples where it can be and theaters, by the way, too.

Theaters can be changed, churches can be changed.

So the fact that this might be privately owned and they may take down a copula or a change of balcony should have no impact.

The the fact that it's changeable in the future, I guess you could consider it, but the fact of the matter is a theater is more likely to be changed than a church.

So the the fact that it the code doesn't, by the way, say that.

It doesn't say, but it might be changed, so don't consider it.

It just says places of assembly.

So I was just trying to figure out what how the planning commission interpreted that and what the city told them because I am reviewing the entire record, and that it was not explained in the record.

And what they're telling me in their report is contrary to what Mr.

Housley is telling me, for instance.

So I'm trying to figure that out.

Yes.

So I guess I'm done with this line of questioning, but that was the reason why I was asking those questions.

Understood.

If I remember correctly though, Ruth briefed us that um one of the things that the planning commission considered was that it could be changed.

So even though it might have the architecture now, the architecture could be changed.

So could a theater.

Yeah, I'm just listed.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm just saying that if I remember correctly, that was the issue that the planning commission had, that it may be a benefit now, but the fact that it's private means that they could change it, sell it, etc.

So there were a package of four major adjustments requested and a package of public benefits, and one of those public benefits was the architecture.

The planning commission did definitely feel that the architecture was a public benefit, but not sufficient for the package of four major adjustments.

All right, thanks.

All right, are there any other questions for the staff?

Okay.

Um I do want to do a check-in.

So for those of you who don't know, uh we have we have an agreement on council that we check in at 9 30 and ask if we want to continue.

Um because we have been going this council have been going since 6 p.m.

this evening.

And so we're we're going on four hours of city council work.

And so uh I made a promise to them that I would check in at 9 30 and we would ask if we wanted to continue.

And I know this might be uh alarming to all of you who've been sitting here, but I'm just letting you know why we're doing this.

So um does the council want to continue?

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm suggesting a 10 o'clock on this, a 10 o'clock termination.

So if the part from what I understand the parties have an understanding, we may be continuing this.

If that were to occur, then um then I think having the parties figure out what would be an appropriate cutoff uh at point around 10-ish, uh, and then we would continue it if there is still an agreement to continue.

I'm happy to check in at 10 at that point.

May I say something?

Yes, please.

We we agreed that we would have 15 minutes each.

Yes.

Uh so that would could take us to beyond 10 anyway.

Uh so I I don't think that would work.

1030.

So maybe we want to do a 1030.

Uh right.

1015.

Sure.

1015, split it.

We'll check in at 1015 if we want to continue.

Because at that point, we'll be going for four hours and 15 minutes.

Um, and I know you all want a good decision coming out of this.

So, and that's usually done with people who are so mayor.

Yes, yeah.

Perhaps perhaps now would be a good time to discuss the del uh the continuate the potentiality of a continuing.

Let's do that.

Um so basically we have not had a chance, staff has not had a chance to discuss this with the applicant, but our thought was essentially we received a packet from the applicant around uh, you know, this afternoon.

It was about 53 pages of a legal argument uh supporting their uh appeal.

And so we want to allow the public and the council and staff sufficient time to digest this new information.

Uh however, we are also up against that timeline, that deadline that uh you know was outlined in the staff report.

And therefore, our recommendation would be to conduct your entire hearing tonight, and then at the end of the hearing, essentially continue the record, leave the record open for additional evidence and arguments, basically members of the public who wish to review that packet and wish to respond to the applicant's uh evidence and arguments could do so for a period of time, and then by law we would leave uh the record open for an additional period of time for the applicant to respond.

That's just a requirement.

Um and then finally we could return and deliberate on the information that we have received, but not continue this hearing, not have public comments, have uh staff report, et cetera.

We would simply return uh all of council would deliberate and then you could reach a final decision.

And that would be the intent behind that would be to continue to uh meet that deadline if the applicant so approved that deadline uh and um you know also allow members of the public time to review and respond to everything new that we've received today.

Uh thanks for sharing that, Ashley.

I appreciate it.

And I'm also considering you know the endurance of us as humans because we all most of us have jobs as well.

Um so just want to consider that as well.

Uh counselor Sogatan.

Yeah, so I have I've actually I have all of the information that I need to make a decision.

I came in ready to make a decision, but given that we do have a new packet of record, I think it would be really responsible for those that especially if you haven't made a decision, that we actually pause all deliberations because we could spend two or three hours discussing things.

Yeah, and that packet could really impact how we're analyzing that information, right?

So that's what I would prefer, even though I'm ready to make a decision tonight.

Uh I don't think that package is gonna sway my decision personally, but it could sway others' decision, and I think that's the responsible thing to do here.

Sorry for everybody that waited here, but I think we need to really take our time to make a decision here.

Any other comments?

Okay.

Um I I was thinking we could hear the 15 minutes for and against and pause there.

Um and then we can make a decision to continue on.

So this is Councillor Al Kerrick.

Go ahead, counselor.

I want to give my opinion that we should finish the meeting.

It's not um I um a lot of people are here, have come here and want to have conversation, and for us to have an outcome.

And if we're coming into this decision and we don't have I would say that we receive information not timely for at least for me, to be able to make a good decision tonight.

So I just want to mention that we've asked people to come, we're having this meeting, we haven't gotten information in a timely manner.

I don't feel it's good to vote on this tonight.

Yes, and um the recommendation is for us to keep the record open um and to to not make a decision tonight.

So is that my hearing that right, Ashley?

That's correct.

Yeah.

Okay, so let's move forward.

Um with Could I ask one?

Oh, Counselor Harris, go ahead.

I just had one other question.

Uh, if you could tell me this.

Would us did the cemetery, which was appropriate apparently originally near Walker Road, if I'm not mistaken, would that be counted as frontage if it were still there?

Would that be counted as part of the 75%?

No, it would not, it's not a structure.

Okay, thank you.

Okay, so we're gonna move forward with the appellants' presentation, um, which would be 15 minutes.

So I would like to call the appellant to come up.

Um please state your name.

You were asked to fill out a blue card previously, so there's no need to spell your name or provide your address.

And you will have a total of 15 minutes for your presentation.

At the end of the presentation, the council can ask questions.

Um, and then from there, we will have another presentation.

Uh Mark, are we gonna get the time put up?

Yeah.

So for the appellant, just so you know, your clock is over there on that wall.

Do you see it?

The 15 minutes.

So if you're wondering where you are in your time, you can just look over there or over there, and you know where you stand on time.

Does that make sense?

Yes.

Okay.

You may begin.

Father Matthew, before you begin, can I just confirm that you would like Todd, Tim, and Andrew also part of this presentation online?

Uh it's Todd and Andrew.

Todd.

One of the public testimony.

Okay, thank you.

Okay.

So we'll start.

Good evening, Mayor Pace and City Councilors.

I'm Father Matthew Swela.

I am the priest of St.

John the Baptist Greek Orthodox Church, also a board member of AEA Sophia Academy, which is the school.

I'd like to tell you about our plan.

Our church is to be built in a traditional Byzantine style, as you can see here, not as a mimic of a bygone era, but as the authentic expression of cla of a classical cathedral.

It will stand for centuries.

We made that clear at the last presentation.

It's solid masonry, everything about it will be here long after the building that we're in is here.

This will be a place of respite for all people, like the cathedrals of Europe, open to all for a quiet moment of peace amidst the modern turmoil.

This is not intended simply as a sectarian group's meeting place.

This is an open cathedral, as you can see by the design.

We received our conditional use permit in December.

However, we are here today because the planning commission required condition 44, a public trail, including including on neighboring property that we don't own.

The exceptional architecture specifically meets what the code defines as a public benefit.

And Andrew Gould will show exactly how these criteria have been met.

Unfortunately, the planning commission did not factor this clearly defined public benefit into its decision.

And I want to be clear about that.

It was not factored into their decision.

They specifically rejected that.

And to be clear, the code defines this public benefit for private and public buildings.

It doesn't make any distinction.

There's no relationship between the demand for a public trail construction and our small congregation in school.

As our traffic engineer Todd Mobley at AKS Engineering will show, we draw students and parishioners from the entire region, being the only Orthodox church in all of the Western suburbs, drawing people from McMinnville and Vernonia, and also the only orthodox school in the entire state.

The staff have presented no transportation data like the AKS study, which verified that cars are the mode of transportation for our parishioners and school families.

If the city wants this trail, then it should purchase at a fair price.

We're requesting the removal of condition 44.

And this is Christina Kemper, who will speak about the security concerns as a parent.

And then Annabelle Fakisa and Johanna Wondimu, two of our middle schoolers will also speak.

Good evening.

My name is Christina Kemper, residing at 29515 Southwest McNay Road in Laurel, Hillsboro.

I'm a first generation Greek American, a member of the St.

John the Baptist Greek Orthodox Church, and a parent of two students at Ageo Sophia Academy.

As a member of our school's parent teacher board, I'm intimately familiar with our community's needs.

AES Sophia is a commuter-based school drawing families from across the region, not only from Hillsborough and Beaverton, but from Portland, King City, and Lake Oswego.

For our families, walking or biking is simply not a logistical reality.

Therefore, the proposed trail offers no functional benefit to our student body.

However, my primary concern is one of public safety.

Having previously lived near the Murray Hill Trail system in Beaverton, I have seen firsthand the tragedies that can unfold on unmonitored paths in natural or wooded areas.

Most notably, the 2022 murder of a 13-year-old girl on the Linear Park Trail stands out as a heartbreaking example.

The perpetrator was a teen runaway from Salem who had been living in a tent in the adjacent woods.

This tragedy, along with several other incidents in that area, some of which I personally witnessed, became the definitive factor in my family's decision to move to rural Hillsboro.

As a physician, I regularly counsel patients on risk versus benefit.

When I apply that same lens to this proposal, the equation is clear.

There is no benefit to the school because none of the students walk there.

While the potential risk to our children, given the heavily wooded and secluded nature of the creek area, is immense.

As a medical professional, I cannot support a condition where the risks so clearly outweigh the rewards.

I respectfully ask the city to remove the trail requirement from our permit to ensure the safety and sanctity of our school environment.

Thank you.

Good evening, Madam Mayor and City Councilors.

My name is Annabelle, and I'm I'm in the seventh grade at OGA Sophia Academy at St.

John's Abaptist Creek Greek Orthodox Church.

I have been attending a Geosophia Academy since I was in sixth grade.

I live in Tigert, Oregon, which is about a 30-minute drive, depending on the traffic.

I have never walked or ridden my bike to attend school, nor will I use the trail to get to school.

Thank you.

Good evening, Madam Mayor and City Councilors.

My name's Johanna Wandemu, and I'm a sixth grader at AyEa Sophia Academy.

I live in Beaverton, Oregon, which is a 15-minute drive from AGEA Sophia Academy.

I've never walked or used my bike to get to school for the three years I've attended.

I also won't use a trail to get to school either.

We have an engineer who studied this.

His name is Todd Mobley, and he'll be speaking on Zoom.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor, Counselors.

I'm Todd Mobley with HAS Engineering.

I'll share my screen real quick if I may.

Oh, I guess I have to request that.

Sorry.

Sorry about that.

If I could share my screen, that would be great.

But I'll we'll get that worked out for you, Todd.

Try again.

Sure.

Yeah.

Oh, thank you.

Do I turn it off?

Um so my firm prepared this memo where we looked at the mode split and trick origin analysis for the existing church.

Um what we did was do some extensive traffic counts both during church hours and also school hours at the existing campus to look at the number of um pedestrians, bicyclists, and vehicle trips.

This table here, table one kind of gives a quick summary.

We found only two percent of the trips to and from the site were made by pedestrians.

That was true.

And then during the school pickup hour was zero percent, and we didn't record any bicycles.

We did show 98 to 100% of the trips were made via automobile.

One of the primary reasons for this, here's a map that's also included.

This is also in the record.

It shows the new site and a one-mile walkshed, which is commonly used as a metric about how close people might be to walk to a destination.

And a two-mile walk shed, which is this outer ring.

Um was used as a distance where people may ride their bicycles.

So and then on this map, it also shows locations of parishioners.

As you can see, there's not many families within that close to the site.

The upper left-hand corner is more of a heat map that shows more of a regional look from there's parishioners that come all the way from Longview to McMinnville, Camus, Happy Valley, Vernonia.

So the trip lengths are really quite long, which leads to that very heavily vehicle-based uh trips uh moat share, rather.

This is consistent with other projects we've done.

We did some work for Central Catholic in the past, also West Side Christian.

We kind of saw the same type of trip lengths for schools like that.

Um it's also consistent with research and kind of some national standards that look at the distance between residences and schools, and how private schools and charter schools have different trip lengths than uh more traditional public schools that serve the immediate neighborhood.

And at this time.

Oh, sorry.

I could wait for rebuttal if we have an opportunity for that.

Um I'm not sure of the 31 pedestrian trips that was mentioned in the staff report.

I just wanted to reiterate what what I've shown you here is based on data that we collected at this site, so we're confident that this is an accurate reflection of the applicant's um trip characteristics.

Thank you.

And at this time we'll have Andrew Gould speak.

Uh hello, can you all hear me?

Yes, we can.

Thank you.

Yes, my name is Andrew Gould.

I'm calling in from my office in South Carolina.

Um, I specialize in designing Eastern Orthodox churches.

I've designed a number of them all over the country.

Um, and in particular, I specialize at designing extremely beautiful historically informed churches, churches that have the kind of architectural beauty that we are accustomed to in historic landmark type buildings, um, a sort of quality that is uncommon in new church structures.

Um, but I I do specialize in working for the Orthodox Church because the Orthodox Church has uh a great emphasis on artistic heritage and cultural heritage, and would really like this church to be a landmark to last centuries.

Um I have um I've been asked to demonstrate how this design meets the requirements of the development code.

So we are speaking of the um public benefits in section 1259 20 of the Hillsbow Community Development Code, um, enhanced building and site design elements.

Um quoting the code.

Um, these elements can be considered public benefits if they exceed base requirements for building and site design.

These elements must be verifiable in a site plan and or through the use of drawing specifications and other materials.

There's then a list of a number of very specific architectural criteria that count as public benefits.

Um I'm going to go through all of the ones that are applicable to this project.

A few of them are specifically for residential development, so we'll leave those out.

Um item A.

Assembly and civic buildings, such as theaters, hotels, cultural centers, schools, places of assembly, and government buildings should include appropriately scaled landmark features such as towers, cupolas, and pediments.

This is undoubtedly a civic building.

Um that doesn't mean a government building, it means a building for public use.

It means a building for public use.

This is definitely an assembly structure.

And the cupolas impediments are prominently featured on this building.

It has a great big dome, aka cupola, and all of the entry doors have pedimented porches.

B projects with edges adjacent to transit streets and major pedestrian routes should include street furniture such as seating shelters, ornamental pedestrian scale lighting, and an inside row of canopy trees to complement those in the curbside landscape strip.

Likewise, we have these.

All of the roof lines have ornamental entablatures.

All of the doorways have pediments and freezes expressed in the classical style.

All of these features are at a monumental scale, well in excess of eight inches of width.

So again, we meet that to the T.

I upper stories should be articulated with features such as bays and balconies.

So this building is built into a slope so that it has effectively a walk-out basement.

So the south side of the church does basically have an upper story.

The main level of the church is a full level above the grade on the south side.

And so on the south side, that upper story is articulated with a beautiful timber framed balcony/slash porch, timber framed with local Douglas fir.

K.

Building entrances should include clearly recognizable features, canopies, porticos, recessions, projections, arcades, raised corners, parapets, pedestrian spaces at entrances, incorporating landscape and eating amenities or encouraged.

So we have all of that.

There are three main entrances to this building, one on each side.

All of them have porticos, all of them have project protectors and recesses.

Hey, Andrew, I'm gonna cut you off.

You are over time.

Um the 15 minutes is up.

You actually that's the end of the presentation anyway.

Thank you.

So I just want to be clear to the counselors.

You have now seen almost all of the packet that was presented to you.

They were PowerPoint slides that were presented to you.

The only exception is a letter from our legal team, and that letter explains the legal ramifications of all of this.

So that's the only piece that's missing from what you've already received.

You've already seen it all now.

Okay.

Thank you.

Um does the council have any questions for the appellant?

Just one question.

Councilor Solgado.

One question for Todd.

Just curious how you measured, because you said you did some on-site measuring of foot traffic.

Like, did you do that over a week, two weeks?

How did you do that?

Did you have a camera?

Just curious how you did that.

Uh I don't know.

Todd, go ahead.

This is on our current site you're referring to.

There we are.

Sure.

Um that's what the current by measuring or primarily was done with was done with video.

We measured both vehicle trips and pedestrians uh and bicycles.

Was done on a Sunday during church activities and the school was the following Tuesday.

So we're taking these two communities to this other site, so these same traffic patterns would apply to the new site.

Okay.

Counselor Anthony, then Counselor St.

Clair.

Thank you.

That that was uh one of my questions.

Um the other question is how are you how are you defining public benefit when uh talking about the trail because I did hear that it's the church is open to everybody, but the trail is not needed because none of the parishers will ever you ever use it.

So those two things are opposite.

It can be welcome but also only to the what we are is a church, and we're building a cathedral-style church, and that church is open to anyone to come during the day, it will be open for people to come in.

A uh community trail isn't anything related to a church.

So the community trail would be a security concern for any school.

I think that any school would not want to have an unmonitored, densely wooded public trail right next to where the children are.

So this is that's the concern that we're expressing about the trail.

The trail would not be utilized by parishioners to go to and from the school or the church because they're all driving.

I'm not I don't know if that answered that.

I'm not sure exactly the connection you're making between those two.

Um yeah, that's good.

I uh it it it's just things that it it to me it sounds opposite when it's a public benefit that the church is there and there's a if it's open to everybody, yeah.

Um however the the trail is not a public benefit because your own parishers would not use it, but others might the trail is a public benefit to the public, but this is not the question of whether a trail should exist.

The question is whether the trail should be at its place on our property and constructed by us.

That's of course public trails are public benefits.

Okay, but that's not what we are what we're offering as a church.

What we're offering is the most one of the most remarkable architectural pieces that the city of Hillsborough have for centuries.

Okay.

Specifically, the code defines exactly what that public benefit is.

Right, yeah.

And and and that and that that at that enders, I think it's just that there were four adjustments asked for and and uh those were all related to architecture, and that's why our public benefit that is offered is in relation to architecture.

Having a trail required is unrelated to what we're doing.

Okay, yeah.

Yeah, sorry.

Hi.

The architecture is absolutely beautiful.

Um a question I have though, also again, the trials.

Um is can you tell me more of the natural uh progression of how the public uses that currently?

I know it's a private piece of property, but are you seeing natural trials occur there to where it's a an easement that pedestrians use to cut across?

Oh, uh I'm sorry, there might be some confusion.

We're talking about the the trail easement that the planning staff has uh effectively required of us, and now the planning commission.

We're not talking about like pedestrian walking past throughout the property.

So we're we're welcome to have people come and and come inside the church, and I don't know that we've made any decision about how the rest of the property will be utilized in that way as far as the public.

Right.

We're here, we're talking about a specific segment where this community trail would be.

I don't know.

Connected to the property.

Cutting across the property, cutting the property in in two.

Right.

I I just meant like now, is there a natural progression of what you're seeing right now before there's even any development, is what I'm asking.

Because I wonder it tells it tells a pattern of how the public uses the space, and I'm wondering if that is relevant to why the trailways significant to the community.

That's what I'm asking.

Like are you what we'll see sometimes is in an undeveloped space that's near urban area, is that uh pedestrians make natural trails where they want to go to cut across.

Um and so that that's what I'm inquiring about.

Uh we haven't, yeah.

We we don't know of any use of any trails right now.

Are on two and a half sides, we have OHSU property, and I think that they're pretty uh certain about not having people come onto the property.

So yeah, our only the only public access to our property is that little clipped corner that we have along Walker Road.

It's about 150 feet wide.

So yeah.

Councilor Case and then Councillor Silano.

Hi.

Counselor Case.

Hi.

Thanks for being here.

Um so my understanding is when you in all the agreements you agreed to the trail easement, and that the disagreement is in how paying for it and paying for the OHSU extension.

So I feel I'm confused by the arguments tonight about not wanting the trail at all, because it seems like that was already a part of the agreement in buying the land is that there has to be that that easement for a trail.

From the beginning, that's what the planning staff has effectively demanded has been that.

That is in no way been a part of our plan or our desire, but it's been something that has been consistently imposed upon us.

And as I mentioned, a quarter of our property be will be inaccessible now because of a trail.

Because if we have a security fence to protect the children from whoever's walking along the trail, now the other side of the trail where the creek is becomes inaccessible to us.

So it's something that the planning staff has imposed upon us, but not something that we have in any way desired along the way.

And then there has been the further imposition of then also constructing it and also constructing on a neighboring property.

So these are things, and this is uh partly why it's been difficult that the code, which is so very clear about the public benefit, what it was not accepted by the planning commission, and that's why this greater public benefit of more in relation to the trail, which has nothing to do with us, has been imposed, is because the public benefit that the code defines of the architecture was not included by the planning commission.

So thank you.

Uh Councillor Sogato and then Councillor Amory.

Yeah, I'd like a make I'd like a point of clarification.

Is that what we're using?

That's what we agree on.

I don't know if it's for Robbie or or attorney.

Uh so we have four things, uh four conditions that we're discussing, right?

And so it seems like a couple of us feel like we're discussing the trail that goes through the property.

From my understanding, we're discussing them paying for constructing a piece of a trail that's not on their property.

So we're talking about two things constructing the trail on the property and also off the property.

Okay.

And so both of those things are things that the commission has says they need to do in order to build this.

In it as a public benefit.

Okay.

Thank you for clarifying that.

Question, follow-up on that.

Hang on a second, Councillor Harris.

Counselor Ambry.

Thank you.

Uh yeah, and just just to just to um you need to answer.

Just to clarify, right?

So the so the so the trail on site is using with the SDCs, and the off-site trail is that 10,000 max.

Um the SD.

So just to clarify, my my question was so I think uh just just to clarify your your uh so your contention is that uh your argument is that uh the church architecture itself is providing all the public benefit, um, and therefore no there should be uh nothing else needed uh for all right, and I believe that that that's not correct.

Oh, yeah.

Strictly adhering to the code, that is correct.

However, every other property in Amberglen, the trees have been bulldozed and big high rises have been built up.

We're offering a property where a large portion of the trees will remain.

So there are a number of benefits that are inherent to what a church is, what a school is, these are all things, but as far as just the strict interpretation of what code allows for, yeah, every single all of those points that were made.

Right.

So so okay.

There's a lot more public benefit, but you know, when when we're held tight by what what the code is saying, it's just that one portion.

Right.

So regarding the trees, uh the uh the request was to remove the the natural resource overlay and to be able to cut the trees, which was granted.

Uh so now if the if the if the plan is to keep the trees, uh but but but but the may but the adjustment had already been granted that yes, you may go ahead and remove the uh natural resource overlay and cut the trees.

So that was something that was requested.

Is that is that not correct?

No, so the the uh SNR permit has not been granted.

That process has waited for this process.

Right, but it is but if we approve this, it will be granted because that was something that was requested.

The the the trees that are being cut down are just a portion of the trees on the property.

That's what that's what I am saying is that all through the parking lot we've maintained native trees, but also all around the edge, we're maintaining trees.

If any residential developer came in there, every bit of buildable property would be completely cleared.

So there are far more trees that are remaining in the development that we're making while also needing to cut down trees.

That's so both of those things are happening.

Does that make sense?

It does.

It's just that that that particular area has some standards and and requirements, and in this particular development is requiring adjustments to it.

Yeah.

Uh so uh and and those have been granted, four of them have been granted.

And in and the uh the request is to to do the to do the trails, which which I believe I'm pretty certain are part of the are part of the Hillsborough Comprehensive Plan.

There are they the those that path that trail has always supposed to be there.

And we do understand that the easement may be a necessity, and definitely that would be further public benefit.

So we we do understand that.

Um that's where the the things that kept on being added at the planning commission meeting at the very last minute as far as construction, this is where it became even more egregious.

Okay.

Thanks.

Okay, are there any other questions?

Uh counselor Harris.

Thank you.

I just wanted to excuse me.

I just want to follow up.

Are is appellant contesting the grant of easement requirement as well?

No, we don't need to contest that.

Thank you.

All right.

Are there any other questions?

Okay.

Thank you very much for coming up.

I appreciate it.

And I also want to thank the students.

Wherever you are.

Um did they leave, did they leave?

Yes.

All right.

And the younger siblings in the hall.

Well, if you could pass on to them that I think they did a great job.

And Andrew, kudos to you.

It's past 1 a.m.

on the East Coast.

So good job, and I hope you have some Red Bull.

All right, or whatever energy drink you prefer.

Um it's not an endorsement.

Okay.

Yes.

City Council's meeting sponsored by yes.

Okay.

Um, I'd now like to call for testimony from the public in support of this appeal.

So if you are here in person and would like to testify in support of the appeal, you can fill out a blue card and give it to the deputy city recorder.

She's right over there.

And the order of uh testimony in support will be as follows.

So first, individuals who are here in person and have filled out a blue card.

Uh, I'll call you up.

Um, and then second, individuals attending virtually and pre-registered to speak.

And then last, individuals who are attending virtually but did not pre-register to speak.

For those of you who are online, uh we're not gonna allow any any uh screen sharing.

So I just want to let you know that.

Um the people in person as well, but I just want to let you know that.

Yeah.

Okay, so the individuals here in person, congratulations, you get to go first.

So I'll call you up two at a time.

Uh so the first is Lily Asifa and Ted Moffitt, if you could come in if you're still here.

Um so we have Lily and Ted.

You can come up and take a seat.

So it looks like we got Ted.

Any Lily?

Yeah, to take your daughter home.

Okay.

All right.

So the next person would then be Christina Henry Hall.

So we have Ted and Christina.

We got Christina coming up.

Great.

Okay, Ted.

And for all the people who want to speak, you have three minutes.

Your three minutes you can see on the screen, the giant timer above my head, and I'll cut you off at three minutes.

Please press the center button on the console when the light turns green.

Um, then you know you're on.

So you press that center button, there you go.

And then this is your timer right here.

All right.

All right, go ahead, Ted.

Thank you much, Mayor Pace.

Yeah.

So what was presented is that we've requested four major adjustments.

What is missed and what came out in the last hearing, the last major adjustment, we're exempted by code from the FARS standard.

That was acknowledged by the commission, and it's still being not acknowledged to some to a large degree, as we just saw.

Furthermore, as we dig into the code, we we've asked for a major adjustment for the street frontage requirement and building orientation.

However, if we go to the code, the plan meets the requirements set forth in the code, provided you accept that there are two uh uh the zoning codes of the urban center research park and the urban center office research.

They're both applicable.

One has no requirement for street frontage and root that is not being allowed as an acceptable development path.

We only are being allowed to follow the O UCOR.

So if we acknowledge that 1224 1060, the research park is also applicable to the entire property, because the entire property is zoned in both things, then there's no requirement under 1060.1 is the table, which says there's no frontage proper a requirement for where your buildings are placed onto the street frontage.

Likewise, the building orientation within that says it your facade must be within 30 degrees of east true east-west.

That is exactly how the building was laid out to be matching east-west, which happens to match the north edge of the property, not the slant that Walker Road cuts off.

So that is the other exception that we're supposedly requesting is we're just saying, hey, apply the UC RP zoning that's already designated to the property.

Second, apparently we need a major adjustment for the main entrance requirements.

But when we go to the code related to that, twelve let me give me a second here.

Uh 1264840 uh overrides 125820 when the subject matter is the same.

But either doesn't really think we get to 1264840 A1 that applies to tenant occupied spaces with 25 feet of road frontage or more.

This is an owner-occupied facility.

It's not a tenant space.

And we don't have 25 feet of road frontage to put our building on.

But we still have an entrance there.

Our main entrance is just facing our parking lot, and we have a nice walkway that goes from that front main entrance all the way to round the back.

As the code requires, there's no exception being made there.

We read the code, we followed the code.

It's just not being acknowledged that what we've done is in line in accordance with the code.

Um thank you very much, Ted.

Your time is up.

Uh moving to Christina, you have three minutes.

Just press that center button.

Ted, if you don't mind, if you could press the button uh to turn it off.

Thanks so much, sir.

Christina, you have three minutes.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council.

My name is Christina Henry Hall.

I'm a newer member of St.

John the Baptists and a mom of a preschooler and a first grader who have attended our school for the past two years.

I'm here tonight to speak in support of this project and to respectfully ask for reconsideration of the trail condition.

This project is a puzz public benefit, and it already meets the city's own standards.

Our church and school are more than a building.

They are community gathering place that already serves and will continue to serve the public every week of the year.

Our doors are constantly open for worship, education, and community events.

This is not an occasional use facility.

It's a living active space that serves people at every stage of life.

We regularly welcome the broader community for weddings, funerals, and memorial services.

We host shared meals, cultural events, holiday celebrations, and festivals that bring people together across backgrounds and generations.

We offer Sunday school programs, youth programs, family events, and adult education that are open to anyone seeking connection and learning.

And while the school has enrollment, its presence and mission are intentionally woven into the broader community.

As a working mom, I can say firsthand that places like this truly matter.

This church and school have provided my children with staple, belonging, and support that extend far beyond building.

When I hear the term public benefit, I can't think of a better example.

But this isn't my personal opinion.

It's grounded in the city's own code.

And as a civil engineer with architectural training, I've spent years thinking about how buildings shape communities.

From this perspective, this project clearly meets the city's definition of public benefit under Hillsborough's commun uh community development code section 1250-900.

Public benefit includes civic and architectural combination through landmark design, social and community benefits through ongoing public gathering spaces, and environmental benefits through open space and responsible site design.

In terms, the code defines public benefit as something that enhances the built environment, creating a sense of place and serves the community in a meaningful and lasting way.

This is exactly what this project does.

Because of these substantial public benefits, any requirement should be proportional to the impact of the development.

The trail conditions require our small nonprofit, where every dollar must be fundraised to finance a regional trail at a scale disproportionate to our to our project, resulting in significant financial strain as well as ongoing maintenance and liability concerns.

In practice, the trail provides no functional benefit to the church or the school.

And as a parent, I have concerns about introducing an unmonitored public trail directly adjacent to the school and church, particularly when the required security fussy would limit our own use of the property.

We support the city's long-term vision for connectivity, but this particular requirement feels misaligned with the scale of our project, especially considering the role we play in the community.

We respectfully ask the city to remove the trail conditions, so that is fair, reasonable, and proportional.

Thank you very much.

Yeah, we want a partner.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And I'm not sure of how to pronounce the name, but Sin Hageland.

Sing Hageland.

I would love to know how to say that properly.

So say again.

Signey.

Signey, okay.

Excellent.

Christina, you can go first.

Uh just press that center button so the green light turns on.

And then go ahead and press that, and then you have uh three minutes.

All right, you got to press that center button down to the green light turns on.

There you go.

We're good.

Yeah, now you're good.

All right, thank you very much.

I'm a teacher at this school.

My name is Christina Collie.

A great gift in having our school located at this particular stretch of property is the unique opportunity for the students, some of whom were here and are here, to become immersed in its ecology, in its flora and its fauna, which we hope will become their ground of discovery.

Oregon is an advocate for environmental education.

A natural water source in particular is host to a diversity of living organisms all year round.

This leads to the possibility of a plethora of studies for students across grade levels.

I am crestfallen to think that a security fence or retaining wall would prevent our students from encountering the wetlands, a treasure for their education.

We want the children to have an enriched and attuned experience of the natural world, not simply as science studies, but in hopes that they will inherit the healthy inspiration of ecologists, poets, and artists who have themselves been captivated by the rhythms and patterns and harmonies inherent in the experience of an unhurried screen-free immersion in nature.

A childhood like this renews hope that in time they themselves will offer their own beautiful workmanship, born of respect, conscientiousness, and conservation with a spirit of gratitude for life itself.

So I don't want those wetlands fenced off from our students for those reasons.

Thanks so much.

Thank you.

You have three minutes.

Just press that button.

Here you go.

You are on.

Good evening, uh, Mayor Pace and City Council.

Um I live right across from a public park in Hillsboro, and the problems there are nonstop.

There are people in the park after hours, shootings, assaults, mental health crises, the police can't handle attempts to camp all over and repeated overdoses that end in death.

The parks and rec supervisor told me every park in Hillsborough has the same overdose and death issue.

Regarding city trails crossing private property, I could find only two examples where parks and rec worked with any religious group.

Both were community gardens, one at Sunrise Church and one at Orenco Presbyterian Church.

For those gardens, people have to attend an orientation, sign a code of conduct, fill out a waiver, and pay a fee.

That's very different from letting random people, possibly sex offenders, walk through your property, a school property.

Sunrise started their garden in 2009 as a voluntary partnership on their own 10-acre parcel with no city mandate.

Aranco Church requested the garden in 2011, 2011.

Parks and Rec built and manages it.

In our case, we have not requested or desired this park on our property, and I'm very concerned about the danger for the children.

A few of the risks to children from uncontrolled public access are complication of sex offender restrictions because they are allowed to access public trails and compromise school visitor management protocols caused by a public trail on a school campus.

Liability follows known risk.

Private schools don't get the government protections that public schools have.

No damage caps, no sovereign immunity.

They face full neck negligence lawsuits if a child gets hurt.

ORS 105.682 gives private landowners recreational immunity when they let the public use their property for trails.

ORS 105.668 adds protection for trails and public easements.

But number one, it's unclear if Hillsboro has opted into this law, and number two, forest easements may weaken the voluntary permissions this law requires.

If a student gets hurt on campus, courts have held schools responsible for not mitigating foreseeable dangers.

Bottom line, forcing a trail onto church land or through private school grounds is unfair and risky.

The church is even being asked to develop the neighboring business property trail, a business that is partially state funded.

While the church runs only on donations from its members, this amounts to an extra tax on individual church members by the city to fund public amenities on top of all the regular taxes they already pay.

That concludes testimony from people who are here in person.

We will now hear from people who are registered online and who wish to testify in support of the appeal.

Do we have anybody registered?

Aubrey.

We don't have anybody registered online.

Okay, so I'm going to skip to the next one.

All right.

If you're attending virtually and have not registered to speak, but wish to testify in support, please raise your Zoom hand.

And when your name is called, your microphone will be unmuted.

Prior to beginning the three minutes of testimony, please state your mailing address and your or your email address for the record.

So do we have anybody, Aubrey?

We have Tim Newsma.

I'll let them correct themselves on their last name.

Okay.

And uh I'm assuming Tim is in support of the appeal.

I believe so.

All right.

We can clear that up when Tim is unmuted and gets on the line.

Can you hear me?

Yes, we can, Tim.

Go ahead.

Yeah, admirable job on my name.

Yes, it is Tim Newsma, and I'm in support of the project.

Uh there have been several people that have actually addressed one of the main concerns that I had was just the safety element of the trail.

Um thing that's not been mentioned is the sequence of construction of the trail, any alternatives to the trail.

The construction of the trail, if this was not was constructed as we understand it was required by uh by the planning commission, it would create a dead-end cul-de-sac piece of trail that would be ripe for all the horrible risks that prior uh people have spoken to.

And um homeless encampments, crime, everything else.

And uh not connecting the trail all in one continuous development all the way down to a major cross section, cross street, such as uh baseline road, where it would then go on down to meet the other community trail greenway areas would be the way that it should be developed.

But past that, there is an alternative to this.

Um alternative to having the trail on uh St.

John the Baptist property, the subject property would be to require the trail to be on OHSU's property entirely.

And it could be fenced off.

Well, this which would allow the children from ASA to access the creek and um other benefits that have been discussed.

So I'd ask that they can uh the council consider that, but also but most of all the council reject the notion based on all the other uh testimonies we given this evening that the the church should have as a requirement uh to build out this to not just donate the provide the easement as an acceptable purchase item or uh build the the uh out the trail, but also to build out adjacent property trail.

All those are onerous and and should not be uh enforced.

Okay, uh Tim, is that everything?

Yes, it is.

Okay, and then we still need your mailing address or email address for the record.

Yeah, my mailing address is 1640 Southwest Winwood Avenue in Beaverton in Portland, Oregon.

We're on the edge of Beaver too.

Okay, thank you.

So this is anybody else, Aubrey?

No.

Okay.

So this concludes the testimony in support of the appeal.

Uh as a reminder, if you're attending in person and have not spoken but wish to receive notice of the decision, please put your name and contact information on the sign-in sheet on the side of the auditorium over there.

If you're attending online and did not speak but wish to receive a notice of this decision, please email at counsel at Hillsborough-Oregon.gov to provide your contact details.

And again, counsel is spelled C-O-U-N-C-I-L.

Okay.

Um now we move to the testimony in opposition, but I promised, promised the council that I would check in at 1015, so I'm 10 minutes late.

Um that we would check in to see if we wanted to continue on, um, which would mean we would move to now testimony in opposition of the appeal.

We have testimony.

I don't know.

Uh we have we have none.

Um, no, we have testimony, right?

We have somebody coming up.

No?

Anybody?

Yeah.

I have no blue cards for opposition or anybody registered online, so it would just be online zoom hands in opposition.

Okay, and it there is no other briefing that we're having that you know of.

Because we heard from Ruth.

Oh, any any additional uh staff presentations?

Not that I'm the okay.

All right, so we'll now move to testimony in opposition to the appeal, and there's none in person.

Correct.

Is that what I understand?

And none registered online?

Correct.

And but we do have people online that may want to who are attending virtually but did not pre-register.

Correct.

Okay.

So if you are online and you did not pre-register, but you want to speak in opposition to this appeal, please raise your zoom hand.

We'll give them some time to do that.

Anything none.

None.

Oh my gosh.

Okay.

Um, however, I'm checking in.

You guys want to press on?

Yeah.

Say again.

I I will just remind the mayor, I believe that we have at least one individual who is neutral tonight.

Yes, yes, thank you.

Uh, I just want to make sure I'm touching all the bases.

Yeah, okay.

All right, so no testimony in opposition.

All right, so we do have one person who is neutral, and that is Shiloh Loren.

Um, and so if Shiloh wants to come forward and just make sure the comments are regarding this issue.

Is Shiloh still here?

Yes, yeah.

Okay, so Shallow's gone.

Okay, that is fine.

All right.

Um there any other questions from council?

Yes.

Yes.

Is that we're are we good, Ashley, to get to ask for questions?

Yes.

Yes, all right.

We're gonna continue.

I think we are.

We are well, yeah.

That was the other question.

Are we gonna continue on with this?

I think we're getting close.

We're getting we're getting close.

We're getting close.

We are getting close.

I just need a little bio break.

Yeah, let's do it.

Let's take a five-minute bio break.

Thank you, Counselor Sogato.

All right.

All right.

Let's do it.

This meeting is being recorded.

Okay.

We're getting there.

Thanks to everybody for hanging in.

Um, all right.

Would the appellant like to respond or present a rebuttal to any of the testimony or questions that we've had?

Um I had a question also.

Okay.

Okay.

So I'm seeing I'm I'm gathering yes, because you're coming up.

Um hold tight.

Um counselor Anvary, you have a question.

Yes.

Uh and I I apologize, counselor, but there will also be time for questions of the applicant following their uh rebuttal.

I always all right.

So yeah, let's wait.

Okay, great.

Um, and how much time do they have, actually?

Are we I believe 15 minutes?

I'm gonna be way more efficient than that.

Don't do it, don't say that.

Everybody, everybody who says they're gonna be quick goes over.

So don't do that to yourself.

Okay.

You uh yeah, we have but uh yes, I I would appreciate it, but you have 15 minutes and go right ahead.

And please state who you are.

Yes, I'll identify myself for the record.

Uh thank you, Mayor Pace Council for the record.

My name is Jamie Housley.

I am the uh land use attorney with uh law firm at Jordan Remus.

My address is uh in the letter that was submitted uh earlier today.

I am the attorney for this uh project.

Um I'm gonna try to be as brief as I I can, and I'm gonna start really, really down in the weeds and then kind of pull us up the abstraction ladder to to get to where I think we need to be tonight.

Um but from a substantial evidence standpoint, uh we submitted a very specific analysis uh provided by Mr.

Mobley at AKS Engineering, specifically looking at the parishioners and the kids that go to this the school, and as the evidence shows, there's essentially no traffic related to foot or PE using that facility, and that is the best the best evidence we we have here.

The staff submitted a memorandum dated today that we we got that now suggests that there's 31 trips that are related to bike ped.

Um but if you peel back the onion on that, you know, first of all, it's not specifically related to the existing facility, it's just the general institute of transportation engineers an analysis code.

Um the code that they use is code 520, which relates to public schools.

This is this is not a public school, this is a private school, and it has a separate category within the IT manual that would be under the the 530 series.

Um and again, that is uh so again the best evidence here is the evidence that AKS has offered um versus the generalized uh information on a wrong category that the city's offered.

Um for Ambry, uh you had asked about the public access to the site, and I think I was understanding where you were you're headed with this, is certainly the intent of uh the church to allow the public to access you know the the church and the grounds and the cemetery and all of that.

Um and the public will have unfettered access to the site via Walker Road um via the sidewalk, um the the bike paths that are along Walker as well as the the driveway access there.

There's no nexus necessary to have uh uh an easement um uh with a sidewalk there to provide that public access to the site.

So I don't I don't necessarily think that that those are incongruent.

Um moving up the abstraction ladder just a little bit more.

Um we as we stated in our letter, we fundamentally believe that the planning commission ignored the code in specifically 12 uh 50 920, which talks about architectural features as being public benefits, and as Mr.

Gould sort of went through the the whole categories, he was talking about the A categories, the B categories, the D, the E, and the F, and highlighted very elements of the building that um is go above and beyond what the standard would be to show that uh that the city would be getting uh a very much a landmark building, it would be uh something that would be notable region-wide uh with all these unique features to it that would be over and above what would be required by the code.

And because the adjustments that we had asked for from a land use standpoint were related to how the building um was on this irregular parcel um with the odd shape, um, it's only fair that that the public benefit here be related to uh those additional things that uh we're doing in terms of of the building.

So with that being said, um we we think that the imposition of this condition uh for our client to build this public um easement trail uh again doesn't uh meet the nexus and proportionality requirements of the US Constitution as we outlined in our letter um because again, they're not necessary to uh uh function for the the church purposes here.

With that being said, however, um I I think you heard our client today say that they would not oppose uh the imposition of the the public easement requirement over the property if um that were necessary here and that the city could uh in the future um as part of a a longer trail network uh go ahead and build through that site at that point, but the obligation would not fall upon the church to do so.

So with that um okay, we will stop.

Stop.

Good job, by the way.

And uh five minutes.

Yeah, father, do you have anything else to add?

No, just any responses if there are any other questions.

Yes, okay.

So uh thank you.

Does the council have any questions?

Councillor Ambry.

I do.

All right.

Um so and this may not be the the you may not know this the answer to this question, but I think a a more fair uh comparison of traffic would be what the pedestrian traffic is right now over there.

But I think a more fair comparison of traffic would be what the pedestrian traffic is right now over there.

There are apartments, uh high density applied higher density apartments in the back of the of the church, and and more planned.

And so uh the you know, so uh comparing what the current traffic is at your current location um to what it would be here uh and just transporting it may not be the best way to compare it because the current correct comparison in my opinion would be well, what is it right now, and what what are the different uh things around the church right now in the in the new place where we do we do have housing and we have higher density housing.

That that's kind of one one thing, right?

We we can't so that that's one thing.

Um and then the other thing is a lot of the testimony that was brought was regarding security.

Uh the the the uh what is before the council is is whether the church pays for the trail or not, not whether there is actually an easement or not.

Is does the church plan to have a fence around the property?

Uh because uh because I'm hearing about uh the security concerns because of the school and the and the daycare.

So is there a fence already planned for for the for the property?

The property already has a fence, it has had a fence before we purchased the process.

All around all around, yeah.

Yeah, and so having people come through the entrance that we have offered on the on Walker Road is exactly where we would want people to enter.

Okay, not to be able to enter through the woods in a way that is unmonitored and unknown.

Okay, but yeah, absolutely we want people to come enter.

That's why we've made the public entry in that way.

And just to clarify, the trail does not lead to any of the housing that's in Amber Glenn.

This is like a maybe a regional trail, it's connecting up with something else further to the south.

Any of the residents of Amber Glen would only use the sidewalk to come to our site.

If you look at a map, you'll see that clearly.

So where the trail is versus where the housing is and where our church is.

Right, right.

To come to to come to the to the site, but they could they could take the trail and go back to to the taking a longer trip for recreation, yes.

They could do that, yes.

Yeah, and that was my point.

And just returning to your earlier point about traffic.

So the way that land use works is that we we submitted development application, and what that looks at is the impacts that are caused by that specific project.

The best evidence here is exactly what that churches, like where the parishioners are coming from, um, you know, elsewhere in in the region or the community, and uh transporting that to this specific location, as Mr.

Mobley sort of had indicated, um, it's gonna result in the same type of uh issue where everybody's uh that's going there for school is gonna be driving.

Um the parishioners are likely gonna be driving, and to the extent that maybe you know uh Father Matthew gained some new parishioners from the neighborhood, you know, certainly they would be able to um come there uh through Walker Road, um just like you know the general public would be able to enjoy the site through the the public access there along walker on the sidewalk.

Okay, all right.

And and just just that just one other clarification.

So so what is before the council today is whether what you know whether the on-site construction and the off-site is is paid by the SDCs uh managed by the church, but not the easement.

So I'm I think he's eventually I think Father Matthews conceded the easement.

Yeah, or so then how would you how would you take care of the security problem at that point?

Uh uh when the trail is built, we'll have to secure it.

So you can have the have it secured, yeah.

Um we were coming to have all of condition 44 removed, and that's where in light of all of the the questioning that's going on, if conceding the easement is what is needed, then that's what we would be willing to concede.

But as you heard from our parishioners and families, it is a concern, understandably.

I think anywhere to build a trail through the middle of a school property where all public can go through that property would be very concerning.

That's exactly what we're doing here.

We're building right through the property with a public trail.

I don't think that would happen anywhere else.

If the trail went to the south on OHSU property only, then this wouldn't be a concern.

It wouldn't be going through a school, but because the city said this is where the easement must go, this is where we're forced into this position of having to figure out how a school is going to have a public path go right through the middle of it.

All right, cool.

Thank you.

Councilor Solgato.

So you mentioned that the current property there's a fence around it.

Yes.

And that fence is so the trail is not actually like in use, it's not accessible, it's not in you.

So nobody's using the trail.

It would be trespassing.

Yeah.

Okay.

So if you were not to purchase the property, if you were not to build for the next five, ten years realistically, we would have that section undeveloped and nobody uses the trail, correct?

Correct.

So the fact that you're building on it is what's triggering this from the city that's saying you need to build this because you're developing in an area that we created this code and that's plan because we had this vision for this area.

Yeah.

And so to me, yeah, that's that's important for me to understand because uh I think part of the narrative that I I just shook off with that is I thought there was already a trail that people were using and that you were interfering with already a natural trail that's there.

And so that's that's really helpful.

So thank you for pointing that out.

Yeah, and and uh this property is it's it's uh it's all been very natural for many years, and that's what we would like to keep and enjoy for the students, especially to be able to go down to the creek and do their environmental sciences studies there.

That is what we envisioned.

And so just to have the trail go to the south on the OHSU property and come around and meet up with the OHSU property on the other side of ours, would be answering all of this.

All of this counselor sinclair, you look like you're want to ask a question.

I want to ask questions, but I think it's more direct directed towards staff.

And it's too late.

Um can we ask questions to staff, Ashley?

Uh yes.

I we have time for final questions for staff, I believe, after uh the applicant is complete.

If it is related and you want to kind of have a question of staff and then ask the applicant more questions, you're welcome to do that now.

Okay, and and please stay up there, guys, if you don't mind.

Okay, so go ahead.

Okay.

So I'm I can't help but think about um parks and uh rec's uh systems uh plan and that elements like Turner Creek Park have um a pathway that is in that buds to a school and leads to uh the Turner Creek Park, and it has an eight-foot fence around it, and it is um maintained by parks and rec.

Um I I can't help but visualize that when I hear you describe uh the trail and then also the responsibility of who it goes to.

Um basically what is the this is the transportation system versus the parks and rec system plan that I'm I'm comparing the two.

They're they're separate, they're not the same.

But uh how is can we further I'm I'm not understanding the responsibility of their property line, the church's property line with the trailway.

I'm I'm not I'm not understanding the responsibility of the trailway.

So are you asking about the connection between the development and the request for the trail?

Yes, because when I think that would be like the property owners that align along Turner Creek Park with the the back trailway that they'd be responsible for it, and they're not.

Yeah, so I believe that um you're essentially asking for the analysis of the nexus and proportionality, right?

That's that's kind of what I'm hearing is the connection, the nexus, and that's the first part of the the Fifth Amendment um analysis that we have to do.

So the nexus there, the nexus that uh staff has seen uh and observed is really through their own uh supplemental staff report that they provided, uh they reviewed the number of uh additional pedestrian uh or the number of district additional pedestrians and the uh additional foot traffic that would be generated on the site as a result of this uh development, and uh conservatively they believed it was uh 31 or more, and so uh the connection between just the development of that church in and of itself uh would be generating that additional foot traffic, and so that would be the connection of why, in addition to the fact that it's already within the parks master plan as a proposed trail.

Um that is the connection to why the uh the planning commission ended up recommending the trail as a public benefit.

But the responsibility of it is what I'm not understanding.

I I'm still, even though I I I heard the explanation.

Are you just to clarify?

So you're you're asking if the trail got built out, who would be responsible for maintaining it?

Yes, oh maintenance, okay.

I understand.

Ruth can answer that.

I think guessing that was what you meant.

Yes, parks would maintain the trail.

So again, if parks going to maintain it, and it's I'm not understanding why a private entity would have to give SDCs to it.

Okay.

Um, so uh system development charges, there are um they are tied to every development um in the city.

Um the two primary ones are for parks and transportation development tax.

They vary based on the use category.

So this particular use category has two uses the church, the assembly use, and the school.

And um that is generating um additional usage of the park system.

So the city has adopted a methodology of collecting that fee from um uh every new development that comes in.

We collect it during the building permit process.

In this particular instance, um what we um recommended and the planning commission um agreed to was that money rather than collecting it from the applicant, it goes towards construction of the trail versus um it going into a large general pool of money for construction of a trail somewhere else in the city, who knows where, or improvements to a park, that money is being used directly within the Amberglen plan district and and is related directly to that development activity.

And I will just also note that that is a common approach for public improvements in the city.

So typically, if it is a situation where a private entity is constructing a public improvement, um, at some point it'll still be dedicated to the city for ownership and uh likely city maintenance, uh despite it being constructed uh and planned privately.

Okay, um councillor Ambry.

Thank you.

Um I didn't I had another question.

So uh if the easement was not hypothetically in on your property, uh but it it was if the trail was going through OHSU property, would would you be opposed to funding that trail construction for public benefit?

We don't mind giving what money is needed for the SDC, but that that has to happen.

No, the other the other 10,000.

That's what I'm saying.

Yeah, giving giving money towards that is is not so much the issue, it's that we're not builders, we're not developers, and the idea of us constructing a trail, we don't even know how to construct a church yet.

We're not developers, and so to I understand why from this city staff's perspective, it's easier better to just have the the private entity do the construction, but we're not real estate developers, we don't know how to do this kind of thing, and it just it seems terrifying, quite frankly.

Like how you would be okay.

So SDCs are due, that's that's just that's just a percentage, but the other 10,000 for the off-site that that you would still that you would you would be okay with that.

So that so the money is okay.

Yeah, yeah, it's constructing, yeah.

Counselor Case.

Yep, it's 11 o'clock.

Okay, I yeah, you can do it.

I just lost the question.

Thank you so much.

All of you, thank you so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um it had to do uh so if we if the city here we go.

I got it, I got it.

Everything's great.

Um so if the church builds the trail, that's part of the issue, right?

You don't want to build the trail, you're okay with there being a trail, sort of, but like you understand the easement needs.

So if you pay your SDCs instead of us letting you use the SDC fees to build the trail yourself, um if we build the trail and the extension, what's the timeline for that?

Has that question been answered and I wasn't paying attention?

No.

Do we know if there's a timeline?

It felt like it was like someday we'll build this trail, but what we're trying to do is just get it built now while you're already doing a bunch of construction.

But if the city builds it, am I way off base, Ruth?

So um hi again.

Um so there's a couple different perspectives on that.

The first is that we have um a pot of money that these sorts of transportation um like trails or parks improvements gets pulled out of and paid for by the park's SDC fees.

Um, but there is also discretion as far as how that money gets used.

So when it's in that large pot, um the money may be used, for example, for um, you know, improving the swimming pool, you know, versus adding a trail network.

I will say that this is the missing link as far as the easements that we have all up and down this Bronson Creek corridor, and it'll provide that connection from Walker Road all the way down south to Gibbs area.

Okay, I'd really like to close this out.

Counselor Sergato, you have some yeah, I just wanted to point out clarification on the process of how we're moving through this, right?

Because uh it was my understanding that there's gonna be a time for us to kind of deliberate and and have a conversation amongst the city council.

And right now we're doing QA, but I feel like uh the past five or ten minutes, we've kind of done a little bit of negotiating and trying to see what could work and what could not work.

So I just want to just clarify how this process is gonna like what what are the steps that we have left and when is the right time to have these discussions?

Yeah, that's a great queuing up for the next element of this conversation.

Thank you, counselor.

Um I would say that uh once this conversation has completed, the next procedural step would be deliberations.

You would close the public hearing and then you would deliberate as a counsel on everything that you have heard.

My recommendation and staff's recommendation because we received that packet from the applicant uh earlier today, uh, and we still need to digest that information.

You all do as well, um, and the public does as well.

My recommendation would be after this conversation is complete, continue as I kind of briefly described earlier.

Um, continue the hearing to allow for only those deliberations.

In another meeting.

In another meeting.

Yeah.

So I'm trying to get there.

Yeah.

Okay.

That's okay.

So we as the applicant, first of all, would uh object to that.

I know that the 120-day clock is gonna run in three days.

Um we will not be offering an extension.

Well, you submitted further info today, and we need time to review it.

The the city also submitted further info today.

Yeah.

Um, but we need time to review all that.

Um I was going to ask if you would consent to a timing extension so we can review all that.

No, respectfully, I think uh as Father Matthew uh stated at the outset, uh, all of the information uh had already pretty much been provided, other than the legal memorandum from our office.

Um, quite frankly, we were uh surprised that uh a traffic memorandum came in from uh the city today, but we responded to that uh here in rebuttal.

I'll just note that we did uh provide that on Monday.

It was dated the 21st, which is according to my calendars today.

Okay, there is a unique procedural expectation that is specific to council, where the every staff report and supplemental staff report is dated for the hearing versus the date of when it was actually issued.

It does create some confusion, so we track that internally, and this is an instance where it's created that confusion.

It was issued on Monday.

Okay, so you do not consent to that.

We do not.

Okay.

Um staff, are there any other comments on the testimony or any additional staff information to provide I would just recommend a very brief recess to discuss uh your options?

Okay.

Um should we close the meet uh hearing first or no?

Uh that would work.

Yeah, okay.

Great.

Okay, so do I have a motion to close the public testimony portion of the hearing?

Here are so moves.

I have a second second case.

Okay, and and uh before we take a roll call, just so everybody's clear.

Uh once we close the public hearing, the council is no longer able to ask questions of the appellant or the public.

Uh and clarifying questions can be asked of city staff and legal council as long as the responses do not introduce new evidence.

Okay.

All right.

So we have a motion and a second.

Um, can I get a roll call councillor Anvary?

Uh aye.

Counselor Case.

Aye.

Counselor Harris.

I counselor Sinclair.

Aye.

Counselor Salgado?

Aye.

Counselor Alcair.

Okay.

Um, thank you very thank you very much.

And we will take uh a recess to discuss our options.

Uh we'll come back at 1110.

Yeah.

So are you good, Ashley?

You need a few more minutes.

Yeah, I have just have perhaps one more minute.

I haven't um I'm waiting for a document to hit my inbox.

Thank you.

All right, sure thing.

So if you need a few more minutes to do anything, grab a snack.

Go ahead.

Thanks everybody for your patience.

I'm going to turn it over to our city attorney, Ashley.

Yes, thank you, Mayor.

So at recess, uh, we spoke to the applicant's team and uh we reached uh bit of a consensus on a revised language for condition 44, which the applicant's attorney is going to discuss.

Okay.

Jamie.

Yes.

Um thank you, Mayor.

So I I think from the applicant's team, we would uh agree to an easement uh over the property um for the benefit of the city for future construction of a trail, and we would agree to a non-remonstrance agreement as part of that easement document um to allow again the city to do the the construction there.

Uh you heard Father Matthew say that we would agree also to contribute the the ten thousand dollar um capped amount uh towards the the the furtherance of that um process and then the SDCs that would be uh applicable to the the property would be um could be used by the city to uh build the trail in the future.

Okay.

Any questions on this proposal?

Okay.

Does it cover that $10,000 for the extension of the the OHSU part of the trail or just their part of the trail?

I'm sorry.

This would cover both aspects.

It would be uh easement dedication on their property, and then it would be SDCs for the uh design and construction of the trail or for you know whatever purpose the SDCs are used for on the property, and then it would be ten thousand dollars uh that could that would be used for the design and construction of the trail off site.

Thank you.

Okay, are there any questions from council of either from the appellant or from staff?

So that's a total of 50,000 altogether.

No just ten.