[MissoulaGov] Committee Update 6-24-09

[Ryan Morton]

On PAZ:
 
I think what you accomplished on ADU's was quite good.  The overlay would
have been just as onerous as an upzone (and likely more controversial).  At
least this way, when people do upzone to multifamily levels they get ADU's
by right.  Perhaps in a couple of years we can progress to ADU's as a
conditional use in single family zones.  I think what you did was a positive
step both for getting ADU's to become an acceptable part of the development
landscape AND getting ADU opponents to vote for ADU's in multifamily zones.
The occupancy standards should help ease concerns as well.  I think you
should be very happy with what you accomplished in PAZ and hope that sort of
work can be done on the remaining issues.
 
Sometime change comes slowly. There's nothing wrong with that.  We're not in
an "Emergency ADU Deficit" or anything.  It's simply one tool of many to
provide much needed affordable housing for rent (renters are not bad even if
they are university students - for those of you out there who consider uni
students to be like the plague).
 
Small lot homes, townhomes and duplexes are also good tools for affordable
housing that are still "in" the Rewrite.  I'm really happy to see Missoula
moving towards a nice mix of housing options.  Keep up the good work!
 
On the procedure debate:
 
I agree that I'm sick of it, but it sounds like the one week waiting period
eases some concerns.  I think there's nothing wrong with this procedure if
it quiets the dissent.  Please don't fuel that fire by calling it out of
order.
 
Ryan Morton
Government Affairs Director
Missoula Building Industry Association
406.543.4423 or 406.546.0902 (cell)
ryan at buildmissoula.com
 

  _____  

From: missoulagov-bounces at cmslists.com
[mailto:missoulagov-bounces at cmslists.com] On Behalf Of Bob Jaffe
Sent: Wednesday, June 24, 2009 10:41 PM
To: missoulagov at cmslists.com
Subject: [MissoulaGov] Committee Update 6-24-09



Greetings,

This morning we set the public hearing for the new panhandling ordinances in
Public Safety. 

The panhandling working group has been organizing a number of efforts like
the "Real Change" program and the work on this ordinance. This link takes
you to the referral and ordinances:

http://www.ci.missoula.mt.us/DocumentView.aspx?DID=1654

 

The whole thing pushes both my liberal and libertarian buttons.  I don't
really like making laws to make things harder for the destitute. And I'm not
sure we really need a law that tells folks they can't "force themselves upon
the company of others." But there is no doubt aggressive panhandling is a
major bummer for those trying to attract visitors and shoppers to downtown.
The police say they need a more specific ordinance to respond to the
requests of merchants and citizens.  Ellie Hill from the Poverello assured
us that the serial inebriates have no interest in interaction with the
police and will quickly learn and follow the new rules. A similar set of
rules was passed in Billings. Even though they have had very few citations
they had a high level of compliance and complaints dropped significantly
after passing the ordinance. We set a public hearing for July 27th.

 

In PAZ we continued our discussion on the zoning ordinance. We had the long
public hearing Monday night. Most folks probably read the Missoulian
coverage. There were about 100 people there. Maybe 50 spoke. The ADU was
still the focal point of much of the comment. I counted off about 30
comments in favor or the project and ADU's. About fifteen against, and five
or so who spoke only to specific technical issues.  On Stacy's request, a
table was set up at the entrance with forms for people to submit written
comment. This worked pretty well. There were an additional 18 comment forms
submitted. Most with well articulated points of view. They were pretty
evenly split on support and opposition on the ADU issue.

 

The following morning we returned to committee and returned to the motion on
the floor from last week to send the whole thing back to the planning board.
After a pretty lengthy discussion the motion failed and I attempted to move
the discussion on to the topic of the ADU overlay.  There was much wrangling
about process. Dick made a motion to do something like just endlessly talk
about issues but not make any amendments until some later date.  We
"frittered" away about two hours on that nonsense. It wasn't until the
fourth call for the question that I finally got a majority to be done
talking about it and we were able to dispose of the idea.  So we were back
to the main motion to adopt title 20 with some bizarre caveat that if the
question is called on the main motion we have to wait seven days to actually
vote on it.  I may yet call that divergence from procedure out of order.
There appeared to be some concern that we would force the thing back to the
floor before everyone had an opportunity to have their issues heard.
Possibly as we get further into this and all the suspicion and fear subsides
we will be able to just dispense with the weird seven day waiting amendment.
The frustration level was extremely high at that point in the meeting so we
took a recess. After a few minutes we reconvened and spent the remaining 45
minutes just asking questions of our consultant. That part was pretty
productive so I chose to provide another hour or so at today's meeting for
more Q&A

 

So we started off this morning's PAZ with more random Q&A for the
consultant. Then we got into the ADU discussion. Stacy moved to allow them
by right in the multi-family zones. Then Jon made a substitute motion to
exclude the option for the ADU overlay from the single family zones. After
much discussion and minor amendments both motions passed. Jon's with
Marilyn, Dave, Renee, Dick, Lynn, Jon, and John.  Stacy's with Marilyn, Ed,
Jon, Myself, Stacy, Pam, Jason, and Dave. Hendrickson Abstained. It had all
the appearance of a glorious moment of compromise amongst the council but in
reality it was the usual liberal giveaway. Best I can tell the ADU doesn't
really offer much to the multi-family zones and now they can't even be had
in the single family zones with an overlay rezoning process. But the goal
here is to pass title 20. Hopefully this gets us closer to that goal. My
intention is to refrain from revisiting this issue in committee. There may
be some further amendments on the floor once the details really get worked
out.

 

After the lunch break we had A&F. The CDBG-R grant that we were going to use
for replacing park equipment was denied. HUD decided that parks were not
considered infrastructure for low income families. We disagree. The mayor
argued the case all the way to Washington but it didn't get anywhere. HUD
announced the final decision that recovery money could not be used for parks
on the same day the white house announced that they were getting a
playground. So now we are going to use the money for repairs to the
pedestrian railroad overpass. There are some structural issues to address
and we want to get rid of the pigeon roosts and the homeless hiding places. 

 

In Public Works we approved various sewer related contracts and the CMAQ
grant contract for the bike/ped program.  A few of us have concerns about
how some of this money is being applied but this wasn't really the time to
take it up.  We will need to try to remember to have this conversation much
earlier in the process next year.  The main concern is whether the best use
of this money is on various promotional and educational efforts as opposed
to hard infrastructure.  Could the $11,000 we spend on the bike ambassadors
do more for cyclists if it was spent on creating more bike lanes? Are the
little signs telling us that we are on a safe route to school more important
than actually doing something to make the route safer? It's a discussion
worth having at another time.

 

In BCOW we pretty much finished up the budget. There are still a few loose
ends so we held off on approving the preliminary budget. It always gets
amended later when final numbers are in but there are still some
negotiations happening that could change things.  If the unions are
unwilling to work with us on the health care contribution reductions we may
need to come back for more cuts.

 

Thanks for your interest, 

 

         

 

Bob Jaffe

Missoula City Council, Ward 3

1225 South 2nd West

Missoula, MT 59801

(406) 728-1052

 

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