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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2009-12-14 TranscriptionDecember 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 1 Council Present: Bailey, Champion, Correia, Hayek, O'Donnell, Wilburn, Wright Staff: Helling, Dilkes, Karr, Fosse, Rocca, Hargadine, Long, Hightshoe, Moran, Yapp, R. Jensen, Davidson, O'Malley Others Present: Council Appointments: Bailey/ First item on our work session is Council appointments, and I assume that this is the Aid to Agency appointment...that was suggested by Council Member Wilburn...to appoint right away. So...this is, uh, to review our Aid to Agency funding. (noise on mic) two people serving on this. Champion/ I...I'd be (mumbled) Bailey/ Connie. Wright/ The last couple years I guess (mumbled) trade that off to somebody else (mumbled) Champion/ ...have some... Bailey/ Would you like to do it? (several talking) Champion/ I mean, if somebody else wants to do it, it doesn't have to be me! Bailey/ Ross, you suggested this. Did you have any interest in doing it? Wilburn/ Nope! (laughter) Bailey/ Oh, thanks! Great! Nicely done! (laughter) Wright/ I guess that answers... Bailey/ Yeah, okay...well, gotta ask! All right. Wilburn/ But I thank the Council for being willing to take a look at it sooner rather than later so that we're ready to move on it and help the agencies with their decisions as they're going through their budgeting stuff right now. Bailey/ I think that makes sense. Thank you... Helling/ I might mention too just...you had expressed an interest in making these decisions during your budget discussions, rather than just a flat amount and then allocating it later, This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the lowa c.;-ty ~:ity Louncii regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 2 so I've talked with Linda and we're on a track to get that done so that you can have the recommendations (mumbled) Bailey/ Thanks, Connie and Mike. All right, let's move into the City Steps presentation. City Steps Presentation (agenda #7): Long/ Hello! Tonight we have a public hearing, and a resolution adopting the 2011 through 2015 consolidated plan for Housing (mumbled) Services for Iowa City's low-income residents. Or as we call it, shortened it to City Steps. And after a...this is basically a framework for the allocation of CDBG and Home Funds for Iowa City for the next five years. It's...it's a guide. After extensive public input, uh, public hearings, surveys, um, put on by...from Eric Fulmer's firm, from Mullen & Lonergan Associates, is here tonight to do a short presentation of...open it up for comments, but we'd like to adopt this plan. Eric. Fulmer/ We'd like to talk to you about two aspects of the five year consolidated plan tonight. One is the process that we followed in preparing the plan, and second is the priorities that are established in the plan for the use of Community Development Block Grant funds and Home Funds over the coming five years. Just in terms of process (unable to hear) expansive outreach to a group of stakeholders in the city that represents a cross section of practitioners and um, other individuals that play a role in (unable to hear) development (unable to hear). So as you can see (mumbled) organizational meeting (mumbled) all of these different (mumbled) they all provided input in a group setting, mostly here in City Hall. Then we took it one step further and conducted face-to-face interviews with key stakeholders in the city, including Captain Johnson whose photograph appears (unable to hear) all of the types of organizations that we met with, face-to-face, in preparing the consolidated plan. Then we conducted what we considered to be some special outreach techniques. We actually attended a breakfast at the Agave Cafe and we, uh, found out that there is such a thing as a free lunch in Iowa City at (mumbled) they fed us and treated us very nicely when we met with them (unable to hear) about the needs of homeless and other individuals within your city that rely on community development and home funded... funding. And then we participated in a public hearing that was very well attended... at the City Library, and another aspect of the outreach process was an online community-wide resident survey in which there were 50-some questions posed to residents at-large in Iowa City and they responded by way of the Internet, and we had a very good response to that survey, as well. Um, we extended questionnaires to all of the above groups of stakeholders so that we could document the various forms of input into the five-year consolidated plan. And in terms of the data that we used, we had a variety of statistical data. We used previous studies, and uh, took information from those documents and incorporated them into the five-year CP. Conducted direct surveys (mumbled) questionnaires aimed at all of the different special interest groups that come in touch in some way with housing and community development issues in the city. Once we did that, we...we're in a better position to establish the priorities for the use of Block Grant Funds and Home Funds for the next five years. By and large, the priorities have remained fairly consistent in Iowa City from the last five year consolidated planning This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 3 process to this five year consolidated planning process, and that has a lot to do with the nature of the funding, the eligible activities that the City can carry out with Community Development Block Grant Funds and Home Funds, and we found that many of the needs have not changed significantly, uh, in terms of the emphasis that's required to address those needs. So, the first need that we looked at is housing. Many of these activities are carry-over priorities from the previous five-year consolidated plan. You can see how they carried over into the 2011 to 2015 period. And then the second area of priority was in the area of homelessness, and again, uh, we can see that many of the needs and priorities remain somewhat consistent. Those needs are broken down a little bit in more detail on the right-hand column, primarily that's a function of the HUD tool, the CPMP tool that we use to prepare a consolidated plan for the first time in Iowa City, which is a HUD document, uh, that helps us to organize the information that's included within the five-year consolidated plan. Then the third area is public service, and job creation types of activities. And our priorities are very consistent from the last five-year plan to this five-year plan. We intend to continue public service activities, and include public facilities, improvements to public facilities that house those services, and also continue economic development and loan activities, and also job training for lower income and low-wage residents of the city. And then finally, we considered persons who are not homeless but require supportive services. And those priorities again remain consistent from the last five-year consolidated plan to this five-year consolidated plan, and we listed, uh, five different categories of special need, uh, households and special need individuals that require assistance from the Community Development Block Grant program. And then finally, uh, the five-year CP was reviewed by the Housing and Community Development Commission, and their comments can be found in a memo that appears in front of you tonight. It's dated December 9th. They've requested some fine tuning of the Consolidated Plan. They're not major deviations from the draft document that's been on display for 30 days, but these are described in your packet. With your permission, these changes will be incorporated in the final version of the Consolidated Plan that would be submitted to HUD (mumbled) occur in May, uh, May 15th exactly of 2010, and between now and then the City will be disseminating its application packets to parties that are interested in applying for Community Development Block Grant and Home Funds, and then the City will be in a position of reviewing those project proposals and determining which projects will be included in the, uh, action plan for fiscal year 2011. On this final slide we wanted to give you a preview of the different sources of funds that comes into play in carrying out the 2011 Community Development Block Grant program. We're not just limited to the CDBG Home program. There's a, um, rehabilitation program, homeowner rehabilitation program, called GRIP, and uh, obviously the (mumbled) very large part of the funding that would be made available for housing and community development activities, as well as a grant through the State's I- Jobs program. So there's $3.8 million of sources that are coming in to the program for 2011. Are there any questions that we might address about the prioritized...the priorities that are established in the five-year Consolidated Plan or any questions about the Consolidated Plan process, at all? Bailey/ Any questions? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City (:ity c:ouncii regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 4 Wright/ Some fairly specific questions that... Champion/ ...about the process. Bailey/ Go ahead. Wright/ Okay, um, I'm just curious in terms of the...we changed GRIP...to GRIP from, what was that, TARP a few years ago, it expanded it out. How much has that been used by the broader community? Long/ Well, we... Wright/ A little more focused before as I recall. Long/ Yeah, right. It...we changed it right about the time of the flood, and so we...we had to scale back, um, all of the housing rehab programs for about a year, so it's...we're just starting to kick it up again and currently we are...the one we just approved recently, it was outside the previous boundaries, but we don't have a lot of good information yet (mumbled) on recovery, to be honest. Wright/ I've got another question for you...probably for you, Steve. Uh, on page 57 of the document, see what I mean, they're kind of specific questions. Long/ Okay. Wright/ Um, the bottom section there, the public policy barriers. I read this a couple different times, and it just isn't quite, uh, hang with me. Undeveloped land that is already zoned for multi-family housing is largely controlled by developers that bring the land to market on a gradual basis. Consequently if anon-profit developer wishes to build multi-family units, he must apply for a rezoning. Do you see where I read that? Long/ Yeah. That... Wright/ Something doesn't click for me in that. Long/ Think what they're saying...that because most of the land is tied up by a few developers, so if anon-profit or another entity wants to come in, they have to find another site that's not tied up. So the sentence above is saying...there's...the land that's...that is developed, that is zoned for multi-family, is already held by someone else. Wright/ So in other words there's just not much land available that's zoned for multi-family. Long/ Exactly! Wright/ That's not tied up by another developer. Is that what this is saying? Okay. Thank you. That was...the syntax didn't work there. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. Cit Council Work Session Page 5 December 14, 2009 Y Bailey/ Did you have other questions? Wright/ I'll just keep going! Bailey/ Okay. Wright/ (laughter) Champion/ Did you talk at all about scattered-site housing? Fulmer/ We didn't, um, categorize the method of achieving affordable housing. We...categorized various types of needs, and if you notice in the document there was more emphasis placed on rental housing needs than home ownership housing needs. We didn't, um, spend a lot of time focusing on how that rental or home ownership activity should be carried out, whether it should be scattered-site or individual apartment dwellings. So the HUD requirements on a five-year Consolidated Plan requires us to speak generally to the issue of priority needs, whether they be rental needs or home ownership needs and how the City would allocate funding towards those. Champion/ Okay. So it doesn't...they're not interested in how we're going to accomplish it. Fulmer/ Well, um...it's a way of giving the City a wider range of options in moving towards those goals. So if the City sees fit to carry out scattered-site housing as opposed to multi- family housing development, it would have the flexibility to do so. Hayek/ On, uh, page 4 there's a funding table...and um, I'm not sure I'm reading that. The bottom row of total resources anticipated... at the lower right it says $14 million and some change. Um...I'm not...is that correct. Hightshoe/ No, there's an error. Hayek/ Oh, okay. Hightshoe/ The fiscal year 11, fiscal year 12, um, first two, the total...total resources anticipated, that was an error. I believe it was double counted, so it's like $3.8 million for fiscal year 11 and $5.1 million for fiscal year 12, but the $14 million at the end, that is correct. Correia/ So fiscal year 11 bottom line, that's (mumbled) Hightshoe/ Yeah, fiscal year 11, fiscal year 12, those two numbers are incorrect. Correia/ (mumbled) Hightshoe/ It'd be $3,868,714, and then for fiscal year 12 it's $5,149,636. That was a technical correction that we were going to make, but... This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Wright/ Would you repeat the one for 11, Tracy? Hightshoe/ For 11 ? Wright/ Yeah. Hightshoe/ $3,868,714. Wright/ Thank you. Page 6 Long/ There are a number of technical errors that we were going to take care of. We just didn't want to bring every one of those to you. That's what a lot of these yellow... (laughter) just minor spelling and things (mumbled) Champion/ Well (mumbled) $3 million isn't really minor! (laughter) Hayek/ Are the quantitative goals, in terms of "X" number of such-and-such units over the next five years, are those goals pulled from the, uh, market analysis from 2008? Long/ For housing? Hayek/ For housing, yeah. Correia/ Seems like there was a high level of community participation in putting this plan together (mumbled) citizen survey, as well as focus groups and... (unable to hear person away from mic) Long/ ...possibly identify. Correia/ And obviously went through our Housing...Housing Commission that approved this on December 3rd. Long/ Subject to the adjustments that... Correia/ Right. Yep. Wright/ Could I just ask for another clarification? (coughing) Excuse me, on page 52, um, the public housing wait list, uh, figures there at the top. Just a definition, uh, clarification. We have families with children under 18, or disabled families, who are Iowa City residents, and number of families claiming (mumbled). I just wondered how much overlap there is between those two. Hightshoe/ (mumbled) of the Housing Authority...there was an error on that page, so number 2 should read the same as on page 51, section B, families with children under the age of 18 or elderly or disabled families who are residents of Iowa City. When families go to apply This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 7 for a...either Section 8 or public housing, they usually get on both lists. Very rarely that a person on the public housing list would not also sign up to get on the housing voucher. So there's a lot of duplication between the public housing and the Section 8. So...Rackis recommended that if you want to look at numbers and who has the residency requirement, you look at the housing choice voucher program. That would be more realistic about the demographics. Wright/ I figured there had to be some overlap in those numbers. Hightshoe/ Yeah, um, that was one of the things that we just got from Rackis, and we'll be forwarding it so that we can correct the numbers as of December 2009. Wright/ Okay. Thank you, Tracy. Hightshoe/ Oh, I also wanted to mention, you guys have three resolutions that you've done in previous City Steps and we spoke with Legal today, um, all the needs are identified in the Plan, the general needs, but the actual dollar amounts for like housing rehabilitation, which is 13% of our CDBG and Home entitlement, plus the revolving loan income that we get through the CDBG program. Economic development, which is 15% of the CDBG entitlement and Aid to Agencies, which is at $105,000, those were all accomplished by...by resolutions. Um, and a lot of those resolutions refer back to the 2006-2010 Plan. So before we, um, allocate all the funds for the upcoming fiscal year 11, we would be submitting the resolutions that if you want to continue those earmarks, we would do so that it would be there to continue through the next five years. Hayek/ When would those come before us? Like during budget or... Hightshoe/ Just before... Dilkes/ The resolution...well, they'd have to be in place before your CDBG/Home allocations were made, finally. Hightshoe/ Before you approve it in May. So it could be now until May. Dilkes/ I think the issue is that...that we didn't want to put those specific allocations in the new City Steps Plan because it wouldn't make sense to tie the hands of the Council for five years to those specific allocations, but if you're not going to put it in here, the resolutions have to be changed to refer to the new City Steps. Bailey/ Any other questions? Hayek/ I've got some, you know, 1've got some questions for Council, but not technical ones. Bailey/ And do you want to discuss them now or do you want to discuss them during the public hearing? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa (;ity city Louncu regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 8 Hayek/ Um, I'm happy to discuss them now. Bailey/ Okay. Wright/ Just before we...I do want to thank staff and...and all involved in making sure that I had very little time for, uh, light reading over the past couple weeks. No, actually you did a terrific job on this and I really appreciate it! We all understand how much work went into this. Bailey/ I was particularly impressed with the extent, um, public comment section. It was very, very impressive! So thank you. Matt? Hayek/ Well, um, let me throw a wrench in things. I...I am going to suggest to the Council that we consider not taking action on City Steps tonight. Um, let me lay out my reasons why ...why I'm saying this. Um, a heck of a lot of work has gone into this product, both at the staff level, our outside help, with the public, with, uh, HCDC, which I served on and know the process there, um, a lot of deliberation, a lot of consideration, and this is a very thoughtful document. It's a very comprehensive one. Um, but it is a, uh, thick document which contains a lot of policy considerations, um, and now it is before us and...and I feel like for us to adopt this would require some...a fair amount of discussion, some pretty needy issues, um, and I...I guess I don't see us doing that as part of a work session on a night when we've got a work session and a formal and a close session on...on bargaining issues. Um...I understand that, uh, and I can go into some of these issues, but there are a lot of things in here that...that we have not as a Council, uh, decided one way or another, and I think they're important issues, um, seems to me that if we could get...push this into January and dedicate a specific work session, uh, to this document, um, and go into it in a little bit more detail, as the seven of us, with the input of staff and others, um, I think it would make more sense. We're talking about huge dollar amounts. We're talking about a five-year document. I understand it can be amended at any time, um, but...but it is...it does contain language that...that...even if temporarily does commit us toward things that...that we frankly haven't really discussed, and I...I appreciate that, you know, there's a deadline of mid-May to get this to HUD, and I know that you have to work backwards from that with...with comment periods and...and with the Housing Commission and with the applications themselves and...and the various, uh, applicants who...who need resolution clarification from us on what...what's available and what the priorities are, um, and I've been through that process, uh, four times in a row when I was on the Housing Commission, but I checked today...my sense is that although deferring this for a final decision into January would make things a lot tighter, it wouldn't make them impossible. And, uh, I'd like to see if there's any interest in doing that...from the Council. Champion/ I...I would be interested. I'm interested very much in looking at the priorities, and I also, um...I don't have any problems if we...I know it has to get done, but I don't have any problems postponing the decision on this. Wilburn/ Can you give two or three examples, not necessarily for discussion now, but so that we have an understanding of what it is that you're wrestling with. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 9 Hayek/ Sure. Yeah, I mean, uh, there's, uh, there's a section, uh, a page or page and a half on...on mandatory inclusionary zoning. We...we have not adopted that. In fact it's on our work session for January, um, that is in there, and...and it is a policy recommendation, but the wording of it is such that it would appear if we were to adopt it tonight, to be a step toward a mandatory inclusionary zoning policy, and I'm...and I'm, I don't want to argue that, but I...but the point is we haven't taken it up, and we're actually scheduled to do so. Um, there is language about, um, maintaining the, uh, the current stock of public housing, um, City-owned real estate and...we haven't gotten into it heavily, but there has been discussion from downtown about whether that is appropriate and...and whether...whether we ought to be moving in one direction or another. Um, we haven't as a Council talked about, uh, rental versus owner-occupied, um, we haven't as a Council to my knowledge even adopted the 2008 affordable housing study. I don't think we have, um, and...and that is...that underlies a lot of the narrative and a lot of the facts presented, uh, in this document. Those are just a few of the examples that I would...I would raise. And I...I went through this on...on the scattered site task force, and you can get bogged down and...and never out of a conversation on a lot of these policy issues, and that's not my goal. I...God knows I don't want to...have to walk through that morass again, but...but there...there are some serious, meaty policy issues in here that we are adopting, uh, tonight if we vote on it with, from my perspective, a minimum of... of discussion. Wright/ I understand, um, where you're coming from. You and I had talked about this just a little bit this afternoon, Matt, and I, um, I agree with you that it would be nice to, in some respects, have a work session devoted to this, and as I thought about it some more, and I thought about what tends to happen to the...the work sessions in January with budget, um, I can see this getting pushed back and pushed back, and I'm afraid if we don't take some action on it, the budget's going to eat this up. And our budget next, this coming session, is going to keep us, uh, more than occupied. Hayek/ (both talking) Champion/ ...special sessions. Wright/ (several talking) Just let me wrap up, I...I understand some of your concerns, um, you know, none of these...the exclusionary zoning you're talking about, the stock of public housing, or the rental versus owner-occupied, is rep...um, represents recommendations that the Council, uh, does not have to take up, and that does not prevent some future Council (mumbled) which maybe need to be undertaken. Correial It seems to me the purpose of this document is it's a required document, require five- year Consolidated Plan, so that the City can receive millions of dollars in federal support, for our... for our community, you know, millions of dollars that have provided incredible investment and...and improvement in the community, and it's an important source of funding that, while it might not be impossible, it pushes back...I understand the ability to put out an RFP so that agencies that do this work can put together applications, and I This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 10 mean, any time you push things back it creates a ripple effect of what they're able to accomplish and what we're able to accomplish, together, in the community, um, and I see...I mean, the inclusionary zoning, there's nothing in...there's required sections. There's nothing in here that says...I mean really even CDBG and Home funding isn't used for, I mean, it's talking about what are the public policy barriers to affordable housing. This is something that's been addressed. It's something that was in the scattered site. It was actually approved by scattered site report and that committee to encourage the Council to consider inclusionary housing. So we actually have a document that I believe...you know, is...and I know, Matt, that you personally opposed that inclusionary, but this document doesn't say the City's going to do this. This document says a previous study recommend, you know, made this recommendation as one way to address the affordable housing. It doesn't require...this isn't requiring the City to do anything. Um...I mean, I...my four years on the Council, and you know, previous three years on the Housing Commission, I've never heard our body talk about reducing our public housing, current, I mean I know we've address, you know, not wanting to increase it, although I would, my personal opinion would be there might be a role for that, um, but I would say there's certainly is a role to maintaining, and whether it's, again, this can be amended at any time, you know, we do a yearly action plan every year to up...to update it every year, um, I mean, and objectively I do think that there's objective data to say that, and especially in this economy and this housing market and this home ownership credit crisis that, um, rental is a... is a higher priority than home ownership because, you know, we...we're experiencing a housing bubble that really damaged so many people who thought they could be homeowners because the federal government's telling them they could be homeowners and they really couldn't, um, and that's...you know, a ripple effect on those individual households for years and years, and so I mean I think that it's a...a just, fair...realistic, you know, to have that as a priority. So I would not...I think that we should move forward on this. Obviously it's my last meeting, I would like to be able to take action on this, you know, so... Hayek/ And...and I don't disagree with you, but I mean, you're...you just made a policy argument, in favor of one policy, and... and I think those arguments should be made, but we're, you know, we're not...we've got another realistically twenty minutes before we take a break, before the 7:00 meeting, and essentially no debate or discussion on...on just one of the many, many issues, and... Correia/ But we have talked (both talking) Hayek/ ...except that this is a...this is a five-year multi, multi-million dollar, uh, policy essentially, and...and uh, I know it can be amended, but...but when you adopt it, you are putting the City's (mumbled) on the...on the language in it, and we will, you know, we spent how many hours in open session on the...on the curfew. We spend hours on end on individual zoning items, whether it's somebody's trees getting, uh, destroyed or...or what have you, and those are important things, and that's the function of this group, but... it seems to me that we're not giving a whole lot of consideration to a very...a very important document, with a lot of policy considerations. That...that's my point. And This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 11 I...I understand, and...and January's a terrible month! Um, but...but, you know, I don't know that I can support this without that kind of deliberation from this body. Long/ Can I just clarify one item? I think Matt's referring to on page 58...there is an error, and uh... Hayek/ You and I talked about that earlier. Long/ Right. It does say the following, and this is strategies to remove negative effects of, uh, public policy -sorry! It says the following recommendations were included in the study and adopted by City Council in Iowa City. That has since been changed. It has not...the housing study was not adopted by City Council, and that was just something the consultants didn't realize. So it...and now it's just going to say the following the recommendations were included in the Affordable Housing Market Analysis -period. Also, did make a comment about...maintaining public housing units, and that is part of the Iowa City Housing Authority Plan that was previously approved by City Council...actually, so... Bailey/ Okay. Hayek/ Well, if I...you know, we can just vote on it. That's fine. (mumbled) Bailey/ Right. I think...I don't hear anybody else, besides Connie, interested in deferring this. Hayek/ Fine. Champion/ Well, I'm...now that I've heard (mumbled) comments, um, I think I can vote for this. I didn't realize how changeable this is. Hayek/ It'd be a lonely night. (laughter) Bailey/ Sometimes it's like that! (laughter) Wright/ I certainly do understand where you're coming from! Hayek/ Yeah! That's fine. Bailey/ Okay, we're going to move on to ECICOG funding. Long/ We were planning on presenting this (both talking) Bailey/ Yes! We would hope so. Thank you! (several talking) ECICOG Funding (Info Packet #2): Yapp/ Good evening. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 12 Bailey/ Hi, John. Yapp/ Uh, most of you were at the JCCOG Board meeting, uh, on December 2nd where this issue was discussed, and the, uh, the issue is how...or if, Iowa City, uh, should fund the East Central Iowa Council of Governments, which is the multi-county regional planning agency for east central Iowa. Uh, currently, uh, municipalities in Johnson County fund ECICOG on a per capita basis, and then the County funds the per capita for the unincorporated areas. Uh, it's my understanding that last spring you had discussed not funding ECICOG, uh, starting in FY11, uh, you were notified of that, uh, a few months ago and took that to the JCCOG Board, and the majority of the JCCOG Board, the Board Members besides the Iowa City representatives, uh, did direct me to prepare the JCCOG budget consistent with past years, showing that per capita, uh, assessment. Uh, my suggestion is that...we form a working group to discuss in ECICOG assessment structure that a majority of the Board can agree on, uh, and I'd be glad to take any questions. O'Donnell/ One question, John. Yapp/ Sure. O'Donnell/ Uh, we're one of the few counties in the state where the...where the County doesn't fund the entirety of the ECICOG. Yapp/ That's correct. O'Donnell/ How did it...how did it happen that...that we were lucky enough to be one of the few counties in the entire state to share in that cost with the County? Yapp/ That's...difficult for me to answer, other than it has been that way since 1980 when JCCOG and ECICOG were first formed as separate entities. I've gone back and looked at the files, looked at the bylaws, and I...I can't answer the why. But, I can answer that it has been done that way since the beginning. O'Donnell/ Well, I'd encourage Council to stay firm on this. I'm not going to be around for the vote either. Amy and I both travel into the sunset, but...this thing is something that we shouldn't be doing anything...extraordinary than the rest of the county...than the rest of the state is doing. I don't know how this got changed. I think it was erroneous when it did, um, I think we should stand by the original decision. So... Correial My (several talking) my only question, and I brought this up at the meeting, was...and I, this might just be a totally separate issue, was um, you know, what if any particular city or entity had to decrease their...their amount that they can give to JCCOG because of their budgetary constraints, and so if we have to decrease what we give by 3% or 5%, then we have to...what it sounded like at that meeting was this is what we need, and if we don't get it, we can't cut anything and then there's also the issue of our budget is so tied to what Iowa City does, and maybe that's not the right...if JCCOG can't say we're not going This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 13 to...we can't give raises to our staff because we don't have the money because all of our partners can't give, and they can't do that because JCCOG is an Iowa City entity, then maybe that's the...I mean, I think that that...it might need to be a bigger discussion about how...because it doesn't seem fair that JCCOG could be held harmless on budget reductions (mumbled) had to reduce its budget. It couldn't reduce their JCCOG assessment. But maybe if Iowa City's saying that we have to give less, maybe everybody adjusts and gives less so it's fair? I don't know. Champion/ Well, I...I think the whole idea of the ECICOG is for the rural areas and those smaller surrounding communities. I personally can't see a lot of benefit we get for that $20,000, except a trip once a month to Cedar Rapids for a very boring meeting. Correia/ Well, I think Henry did share quite a few benefits that we have received, especially with the flood over the last year. Champion/ We would have gotten those anyway! Yapp/ There are...there are some, uh, direct benefits. Hayek/ Don't take that personally, John! Yapp/ Well, no, I don't, uh, not at all. Doug Elliott did send me a memo today outlining some of the direct benefits that he feels Iowa City received, uh, I'd be glad to pass that out to you if you'd like to see that. Champion/ Definitely! Wright/ Yeah, could you share that with us, please? O'Donnell/ John, if we hold firm on this, decide not to fund ECICOG, who will pay for it? Correia/ Maybe nobody... O'Donnell/ No, the County will. Yapp/ I can't answer that. O'Donnell/ I'm fairly certain (both talking) Yapp/ ...the obligation would fall to the County, whether they would pay it or not I...I can't answer that for them. Bailey/ John, what do you think is going to change in the subsequent year that we won't be back here having the same discussion? This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 14 Yapp/ Well, I think we can have the discussion with the other affected entities, including the County, which... Bailey/ Well, I thought we did at the meeting, and it seemed pretty intractable. Correia/ What if we...I mean, my issue was... Yapp/ We did not, I'm sorry, Amy, we did not have the discussion with the full Board of Supervisors. I'm sorry, Amy. Bailey/ I'm just not optimistic that a lot will change in the intervening year, I mean, we're talking about $20,000 here, I mean, that's... Correia/ I guess my issue was then, or...or issue (mumbled) suggestion was...Iowa City gives $20,000 less and the JCCOG Board decides how...how it gets divided. Bailey/ Uh-huh. Correia/ So that we give 339. If the JCCOG wants to put 20 to ECICOG...and then 319, 309, whatever goes to admin, transportation, human services, and then we get a proposal of what does that...what does that reduction mean on JCCOG? What are the potential scenarios, I mean, we've asked Iowa City had put forth potential scenarios to having budget decreases, you know, what happens if we have less money, what...this is what happens. What is the impact on decrease of services if there's that... Wright/ So you're saying...you're suggesting if we reduced our...our JCCOG (both talking) Correia/ Reduced our total by... Bailey/ By 20, yeah, by $20,000. Correia/ $20,000 and you know, JCCOG Board decides how that cut gets distributed. If it...needs to go to ECICOG... O'Donnell/ How would you determine that? Correia/ Well, how anybody does! Hayek/ I'm trying to...I wasn't at that meeting. Somebody...Dale, you played me, and Regenia, you played me at the meeting, so I wasn't there for the blow-by-blow but...is this a who blinks first situation? If... do I understand it correctly? I mean, the 8 to 6 vote was to prepare the next year's budget consistent with last year's to see what happens next, essentially? Correia/ Yes. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 15 Wright/ It was to give...to give the staff the go-ahead to start at least building their budget and having some numbers. Wasn't necessarily a commitment to... Champion/ Well, I think they were committing us to... Bailey/ Trying. Champion/ ...trying to commit us to that, to continuing our stipend to that Cedar Rapids' organization. O'Donnell/ Well, and it's after we had already made a decision. That we weren't going to do it. So, I...I don't know. If we stick with this, I wonder what else we can share with the County. Wright/ John, I'm looking at the fact sheet that you passed out here. My question to you may not be something you can answer, uh, off the cuff. If we did not participate in ECICOG, uh, in the future, what of these items would we not have gotten? Some of these look like things that would have probably gone through one way or another. Yapp/ And I can't answer that. Wilburn/ I might have... Yapp/ I'm in the unique position of having to...facilitate adiscussion when I...when...ECICOG is included in our budget for accounting purposes, but it also because the JCCOG Board as a policy matter controls the budget, and ECICOG's in the budget, that's...that's the policy direction that I had gotten from the Board, but for a specific questions I'd have to...we'd have to get Doug Elliott, the Director of ECICOG, to answer those. Wilburn/ I might have a little...um, experience, information that might...highlight alittle bit of that. Uh, one is partially related to the item about, um, ECICOG being the federal economic development district for east central Iowa. That initiative, and there may have been some others in the past, where...some lobbying has produced, uh, or there've been some initiatives at the state or the federal level in terms of trying to prompt and promote regional planning, and um, and ECICOG staff and some others working with the state have made sure that, um, ECICOG the regional planner is involved in being a recipient of those block funds to (mumbled). Now the question is would a county level cooperative effort, planning effort, like JCCOG, would it...uh, or could it make the case and be included in those type of other state...initiatives, whether it's economic or...landfill or, you know, whatever...whatever it might be, um, so...uh, my recollection with that economic development district is that was a specific effort by ECICOG and some others working with the Economic Development Director at the State at the time to make sure that they were included in... so it would just be a matter of, if those initiatives come up in the future, how...could we make JCCOG eligible to become a recipient of some block of...of funding from, again, state or federal or if they would even be recognized, since it was county level. So...I have a suspicion that that may be how some other things have This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 16 evolved, uh, that might address some of these other items on here, and then whether a, um, particular entity is going to receive funding or they're, I mean, otherwise ECICOG is a place where people can, in Johnson County, can apply for a grant fund that they don't have to go through the City to, and they're going to apply for a grant for whoever they can get the funds. Bailey/ So, we receive tremendous benefit from JCCOG. The challenge is I...I don't think any of us really see the benefit of ECICOG. I'm interested in pursuing Amy's line of reasoning, that if we reduced our...our, um, commitment to JCCOG by $20,000, what would be the impact? And for us to understand what would be the impact, and that would be on JCCOG, and so that's...that's the direction I'm leaning is I would like to have a greater understanding of potentially the impact, and... it could cause other entities to also reduce their allocation, and there could be a huge impact, but that's what I would like to stand firm on this, and move ahead and have better understanding of what...how this would affect the work that we get done, through the entity that actually serves us. So, I don't know if others... Davidson/ Jeff Davidson, immediate past Director of JCCOG. John's been dealing with this for two and a half years. I dealt with it for 26 years, so...um, I think the question that Regenia raises is interesting because given the vote at your last meeting, what may happen at least is that at the JCCOG meeting in January, by an 8 to 6 vote, the budget will be approved with the amount that's in the proposed budget. So that if you then reduce that by $20,000, that would be going in violation of a JCCOG policy vote. Um, it would be a real interesting matter if JCCOG decided to throw Iowa City out of JCCOG on the basis of that vote, because JCCOG is administratively part of the City of Iowa City. It would at least be interesting! (laughter) Um...(several talking) at least be interesting, yeah, um, if it's any consolation to you...the...the debate about the funding of ECICOG has gone on for I think a1126 years that I was part of JCCOG. During the 80s and much of the 90s, ECICOG consisted of a director and one other individual. So the budget was substantially lower than it is now. And I think the debate you're having is a perfectly legitimate, uh, debate to have, um, you know, John has proposed the...the forming of the subcommittee next year. Um, the issue that Connie raised, I believe it was Connie, is...is certainly a...a perfectly reasonable debate to have and that is, uh, if we use, I mean I'm paraphrasing, if we use ECICOG the least of anybody in Johnson County, why are...why are we paying the most? Well, you're paying the most because it's a per capita assessment, and I encourage John, and I encouraged Doug Elliott, not to spend a lot of time trying to justify, uh, that Iowa City is getting $20,000 of value from them. The point is it's a per capita system, and the other entities in Johnson County benefit much more than Iowa City does. It's not an issue in Linn County because the County pays the entire assessment. Cedar Rapids otherwise would be in exactly the same situation. Cedar Rapids and Johnson County pay 75% of ECICOG's assessment, um, so, um, at any rate, to answer the question that Regenia raised, it would come down to that budget vote in January as to whether or not you would, as a matter of policy, be able to reduce your allocation by $20,000. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 17 Correia/ And I guess my...my, uh, point is, is that I'm...I'm taking out the ECICOG off the table for a second to say if Iowa City needs to reduce its budget, other budget areas, why is JCCOG held harmless from those budget cuts? Yapp/ We have not been. Correia/ Well, I don't think anything came forward when we were asking for a two and a half percent...on, I mean, when we were doing that budget exercise, what would happen if, you know, you had to cut your budget by some percent. We didn't hear anything from JCCOG. Yapp/ When...when we were directed to reduce our budget, I believe it was by I%, uh, we did so, same as every other division...in the City. Correia/ But you know what I'm saying. Bailey/ Okay. So where are we with this? (several talking) Wright/ I'm sorry? O'Donnell/ I said I would...I would go with exactly what we decided. Champion/Well, I'm going to hold firm on it, but we could be outvoted. Can they really vote us to spend money? Bailey/ It looks like...okay...let's just do the subcommittee. If that's...if that's how (both talking) describes it, it's going to hap...happen. That's just... Hayek/ Let's do the subcommittee. Let's try not to spend $60,000 of staff time on a $20,000 issue. O'Donnell/ Exactly! Hayek/ However, I'm mindful of the institutional friction that could come from a...a budgetarily small issue, and so I think John's probably on to this...the right approach to take. That's my...my thought. Bailey/ There ya go! Subcommittee (several talking) Agenda items? Agenda items? Moving along, I'll move because we don't have a lot of time. Info packet discussion? The 10th and the 3rd. So we'll do Council time later. Anything on budget priorities? Dale? Helling/Nothing. Bailey/ Thank you. Um, anything on schedule of pending? Dale? Schedule of Pending Discussion Items (Info Pkt #3): This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009. December 14, 2009 City Council Work Session Page 18 Helling/ Again, copies in your, uh, your packet. Bailey/ Okay. Great. Yes? Council Time: Hayek/ Can I say one thing on Council time, because I don't want to... Bailey/ Yep! Hayek/ ...bore the public during the televised session. Last week, uh, I went to a meeting at City Assessor Denny Baldridge's office. You remember, there's this issue of potentially doing a mass appraisal, whether it's outsourced in whole or not at all or in part, etc. I was there. Terrence Neuzil was there. Denny was there, and Brad somebody from his office was there. We had a good meeting, um, they've prepared some information. They're going to present to the Conference Board some specific recommendations next year, and I think it'll come down to whether we outsource most of it, or just take a pass and not pay for a mass appraisal at this time, and just ride on out a few more years based on relatively accurate assessment information presently. So, just wanted to let you know. Upcoming Community Events/Council Invitations: Bailey/ Thanks for doing that. All right. Um, community events, Council invitations. Think we had a couple in our packet, farewell, um, events, reception for Henry Herwig in Coralville. Meeting schedule, you provided to us, so...we're good. All right. See you in ten. This represents only a reasonably accurate transcription of the Iowa City City Council regular work session meeting of December 14, 2009.