[MissoulaGov] Committee Update 10-28-09

[Bob Jaffe]

Greetings,
This morning I had a work conflict so I missed Public Safety. The only item on the agenda was to send an old fire engine off to auction.
In Conservation we had a general discussion on how to improve recycling in Missoula.  Pam Walzer did a little presentation on some of the issues we face. For the most part it comes down to transportation costs.  We do not generate enough volume to make traditional methods of processing recycling economical. So we have to ship them off to bigger cities. Often times the transportation costs exceed the commodity value. Rod Austin from the Downtown Business Improvement District came to describe the recycling program that they are doing. When I learned that the BID was taking over the trash pickup of the street containers downtown I saw an opportunity to make use of the recycling bins that the city had obtained through a grant from Coke. We got the bins about a year ago but could not afford to pay to get anyone to empty them. So they just sat in storage.  Rod was willing to have his maintenance guy pick up the recycling along with the regular trash but we had to figure out what to do with the stuff. I contacted Max Bauer over at Allied Waste and he agreed to provide a recycling dumpster for free. The materials are added into the load from the blue bags program that get bailed up and shipped to Washington for processing.
We also heard from Matt Hisel from Home Resource. His organization generates $450,000 per year recycling building materials. He encouraged the council to look at recycling as an economic development opportunity. If we can find more local uses for the commodities we can increase the value. There are a number of small business opportunities but they will need startup help.
The committee wasn't the best place to come up with ideas on how to improve recycling opportunities in Missoula but hopefully the discussion will continue in a less formal setting.

Next we had our quarterly meeting with the county commissioners to review OPG. This time we heard a presentation from the rural initiatives department.  Rural Initiatives is sort of the outreach department for county government to build relationships with the country folk.  This covers conservation and restoration projects, parks and trails, rural planning, and community support.

In PAZ we dealt with some minor adjustments to the Flynn Ranch subdivision and then revisited the Historic Preservation Ordinance.  The ordinance has a few challenges ahead of it. Proponents would like to see protections to our historic resources. In the ordinances these are defined as properties listed on the historic register, properties eligible for listing, and all properties within an historic district.  This last part is the most controversial as it covers a lot of properties, some of which themselves are not historic resources.  Critics of the ordinance raised concerns that it will create an onerous impediment to development.  The discussion was a little unfocused. We really need to try to build some consensus as to what we want to do with this thing.  We have a month until there is another opening in the PAZ schedule. I'm hoping to work with staff to figure out a way to present the issues so we can move forward.

In Administration and Finance we considered our rule number 24 which establishes the manner in which we approve ordinances.  A few months back Ross Best made a bunch of public comment protesting our rules. He proposed that they were in violation with Montana Code Annotated 7-5-103.  Rule 24, which references this section of MCA,  says we will hold a public hearing for all ordinances.  It says we will first schedule the hearing, which will constitute a first reading. Then we will actually hold the public hearing which will constitute the second reading.  This procedure was also recently challenged by Lee Clemmensen as a last gasp effort to derail the zoning update process. Renee cited her confusion over rule 24 as one of her reasons to object to the zoning update. Even though I didn't think it had any bearing whatsoever on the zoning ordinance, I encouraged Renee to bring forward her concerns with the rule as a separate referral, which she did.

City Attorney, Jim Nugent pointed out some technicalities in the MCA that made it so the law requiring two readings didn't even apply to a city with self governing powers. Since we didn't need to comply with the two reading law, and we had numerous procedures in place that provided for public notification and participation far in excess of state law requirements, we directed Mr. Nugent and the City Clerk to prepare revised language for rule 24 that would be less confusing.

In Public Works we revisited the issue of parking on Nora street. The developers of the new building at the old dairy wanted to be able to use the public right of way for parking. We didn't want to make any permanent deal to give up the road so we sent it back for staff to work up some other solution. They came back today with a memorandum of understanding that allows the property owner to post the spots as private parking but allows the city to revoke this right with 30 days notice. This was agreeable to everyone and required no action on the part of the committee.

I'm hoping this is not my last committee update before being voted out of office. I have some confidence that I will prevail in the election next week but the turn out numbers in Ward three thus far have been incredibly low. I don't know what to expect. Either way, I really have enjoyed working on the council and greatly appreciate the discussions and contributions people have made to this list.

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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