West Linn City Council Meeting - November 12, 2024
West Linn City Council Meeting - November 12, 2024
The West Linn City Council met on Tuesday, November 12, 2024, starting at 6:00 p.m. The meeting included a police lifesaving award ceremony, public comment, approval of consent agenda, a public hearing on parking reform ordinance, and city manager report on lead service line notifications. All votes were unanimous 5-0.
Consent Calendar
- Agenda Bill 2024-11-12-01: Meeting notes for October 14, 2024 were approved.
- Agenda Bill 2024-11-12-02: Temporary Permit of Entry for Abernethy Bridge construction was approved.
Public Comments & Testimony
- Lori Bacon (West Linn resident) spoke about traffic safety in the Sunset neighborhood, specifically opposing the proposed closure of the pedestrian trail connecting White Salmon Street to Oxford Street. She urged the council to focus on addressing the root cause—speeding and lack of traffic controls on Cornwall/Summit artery—rather than reducing walkability. She asked that the trail be maintained.
Major Agenda Item: Public Hearing and Ordinance Adoption
- Ordinance 1754: Climate Friendly and Equitable Communities (CFEC) Parking Reform
- Presentation: Planning Manager Darren Wyss presented the proposal to remove minimum parking requirements from 16 chapters of the West Linn Community Development Code, complying with state OAR 660-012. The state mandate requires reforms to reduce vehicle emissions; West Linn was required to either eliminate all parking mandates or adopt other options (paid on-street parking or parking lot tax). After review, staff and the Planning Commission recommended removing all mandates. Six of nine surveyed Metro area cities chose the same path. No public opposition was received during the process.
- Staff clarified: The change does not prevent developers from providing parking; market forces will still drive parking provision. A check-in in two years was discussed to monitor unforeseen consequences.
- Public Testimony: None.
- Council Action: The council held a first reading and, due to unanimous consent, immediately conducted a second reading. Both readings passed 5-0.
Key Outcomes
- Lifesaving Awards: Police Officers Hayden Eickmeyer and Matthew Goode received Lifesaving Awards for performing CPR on a 68-year-old woman (September 4) and a 2-year-old child (September 11), both of whom survived and returned home. Deputy Chief Patrick Fale of Tualatin Valley Fire & Rescue reported that the TVF&R service area has a 45% cardiac arrest survival rate (neurologically intact), compared to the national average of less than 15%. West Linn Police was an early partner in this joint CPR program. The officers' actions were praised.
- Consent Agenda: Approved unanimously (5-0).
- Ordinance 1754: Adopted via two readings. The ordinance takes effect in 30 days.
- City Manager Report:
- A letter is being sent to approximately 4,000 West Linn households whose water service line material is unknown. This is required by the EPA as part of national lead service line inventory (2021 rule). Water Operations Supervisor Matt Kaatz explained that no lead has been found in West Linn; the letter is informational. The city will continue field verification over the next several years. A dedicated email, phone line, and webpage are available for questions.
- Future agenda items: joint work session with Planning Commission (November 18), mandatory rent burdened housing hearing (December 2), business meeting (December 9), and community events including holiday market (Nov 16-17), tree lighting (Dec 6), and holiday parade (Dec 14).
- Mayor and Council Reports: Mayor Bialostosky, Council President Baumgardner, and Councilor Bryck acknowledged reelections. Councilors expressed condolences for a pedestrian fatality. Council President reported on a visit to Yakima Nation and discussion with Kate Brown on Willamette Falls waterfront plans.
- City Attorney Report: No report.
- Adjournment: Meeting adjourned at approximately 8:05 p.m.
Meeting Transcript
This is your five second warning. All right, ready to go. Okay. Thank you. Um well I will call order call to order the pre-meeting of the Westland City Council. The entire city council is present. And we'll go through the agenda per se. We've got approval of the agenda as always. And then one of our favorite things, our police officer life saving awards. But that'll go to two out tonight. So for our guests here from vote out, we don't have any questions for you, so we're not gonna promote you up, but we might be able to unmute if you raise your hand and have anything to say. Oh, we got a thumbs up. I see thumbs up. Thank you. I'm sure they don't want to talk. They have to uh so I think what you're saying is that you're gonna leave it on the consent agenda. Yes, there are any objections to I always ask it at the beginning of the meeting before I uh we take a vote on the consent agenda, but no no objection. So we'll leave it on the consent agenda, and uh we appreciate all the work going on down there on the bridge. So uh nothing else on the consent agenda and no questions. So that takes us into uh the business meeting, which includes the main item of business only item of business tonight is the uh climate friendly and equivalent communities adoption hearing, which we've been talking about for a long time. Uh guessing Darren will be there for planning department. Darren will be there. Um strongly hoping that Darren is there. Yeah. That's a lot for us to think on if there is something. Yeah. Only 77 pages. It's a lot of changes. Uh and um council's had an opportunity to talk about this in previous meetings. Uh planning commission's been working on it. So quite a bit of work has gone into this, and this is one of those um fun uh ordinances with the many chapter numbers in the titles that are always entertaining to make motions on and vote on. Oh, it's each individual. No, don't do that. And there's a provision that allows someone to require that this be read, the entire ordinance be read. But I hope I hope nobody's bringing that provision up right now. Hopefully no counselors just want to do that. Yeah. Frankly. No, that is our our only item. We had uh as I mentioned last week, we had a number of items, but they've all basically been moved to the December 9th. Um just the manager report, a couple of calendar notes, and uh daily is on this agenda. Uh we may not have that on future agenda. Yeah, I was gonna know I would like that to be taken off when I chatted with my other city attorneys at that conference. They said no one does a legal report out, but um that individually yeah through memos. Always have the opportunity to add something on or yeah to talk during my report. So yeah, is there things? I'll probably say I don't have anything to report out, but in the future I'll make sure that is pulled off so you don't have an extra bullet there. Um thing since we are having a legislative hearing, um, there is a script that the mayor reads, and I have a part and so is reviewing that, and there is you know, where I asked conflicts of interest, and I think in the future, uh maybe we'll have a process where I asked us in advance so we can you know work it out, it's not on the spot. But I just wanted to know do any of you think we may have a potential or actual conflict of interest with the substance of the ordinance. I'll I'll ask that question, but just everyone ahead of the one other uh vaguely agenda note related thing.
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