MEMORANDUM 05-138(A)

TO: Mayor Hornaday / Homer City Council

FROM: Doug Stark, Chair / Community and Economic Impact Standards Task Force

DATE: July 29, 2005

SUBJECT: Final Report and Recommendations of the Task Force

The Community and Economic Impact Standards Task Force was established by the City Council at its regular meeting on April 25, 2005 through the adoption of Memorandum 05-74(A). The Task Force members were appointed by the Mayor and confirmed by the Council at the regular meeting on May 2, 2005 (Memorandum 05-83). The Council asked the Task Force to complete its work quickly and to provide a report no later than August 9, 2005. The tasks assigned to the Task Force contained in Memorandum 05-83 were:

1. Discuss the standards and criteria of the Community and Economic Impact Standards in Homer City Code 21.61.105
2. Discuss the impact analysis requirement for large retail and wholesale business
3. Define and agree on the interpretation and implementation of Homer City Code 21.61.105.

The Committee met on four occasions and plans to conduct its final meeting at 3PM on August 8, 2005. The purpose of this meeting is to discuss this memorandum and its recommendations and findings one last time before the City Council takes the issue up at its regular meeting the same evening. The Task Force considers the August 8^th meeting to be its last and believes that its work is complete.

FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

CEIS Review Objectives: There was unanimous agreement among the Task Force members that the City should always review CEIS reports in terms of what is in the overall best interests of the City. The interests of the applicant or other third parties should not be a primary consideration.

Code Interpretation: There was a great deal of discussion about interpretation of the code at the Task Force meetings. Some members felt that the code was too general in nature, and that it lacked specificity and concrete guidelines for measuring impacts. Others were concerned that the Planning Commission and the City Council might have divergent views and interpretations about what the code means and its intended purpose. At the end of the day, the Task Force members agreed that for now, the existing code is sufficient because:

• The purpose of the code should be to set general guidelines, articulate the types of impacts to be measured, and outline performance standards with respect to the overall benefits to the City of any particular project. The code should give applicants guidance regarding the impacts of concern to the city and be general enough to give the applicant latitude to meet the standards and address mitigation measures in creative ways. In the view of the Task Force, this is preferable to dictating everything in code. (a one size fits all approach).
• It is impractical to draft code language that contains a specific methodology for measuring impacts and a set of standard, required, mitigation measures. Each permit application is unique and is submitted under a different set of spatial, temporal, zoning, environmental, and other conditions. In addition, the economic and political environment is dynamic. In short, the Task Force concluded that it is probably best to allow the staff and the Planning Commission wide latitude and discretion with respect to measuring impacts, evaluating mitigation measures, and making the tough policy calls regarding what is in the overall best interest of the City and its people.
• The code contains a number of social and economic impacts that must be quantified by the applicant. The Task Force agreed that the applicant should not be required to receive a “positive” score on each standard. However, the overall score should be positive. In other words, when the City looks at the collective impacts of all standards that are to be measured, the overall benefit to the City should be positive. The City should work with the applicant to propose mitigation measures that will address the areas where there are negative impacts (a net loss of jobs for example) and to improve the overall score.

Code Implementation: The planning staff raised several questions about the permitting process and implementation generally. These questions were well received and were on the minds of other Task Force members as well. The Task Force agreed to the following with respect to code implementation.

• The Task Force agreed that the planning staff should pay a key role in insuring that the CEIS is complete and responsive to the standards contained in the code before the report is attached to a Conditional Use Permit and submitted to the Planning Commission for review. If a CEIS is submitted that is incomplete or does not address the impacts to be measured, the staff has the authority and responsibility to send the report back to the consultant for further work.
• The Task Force also agreed that the planning staff should play a key role in working with the applicant on mitigation measures. The goal of the City is to approve large projects that have positive benefits for the community at large. Therefore, it is in the City’s interest to assist the applicant in identifying mitigation steps that can reduce negative impacts and enhance the overall benefit to the community.
• The Task Force agreed that the implementation process is pretty well outlined in the code. The staff and the Planning Commission members may need to get more comfortable with the idea that they have a fair amount of discretion to make policy calls.
• The Task Force agreed that the City should closely monitor how the CEIS process works over time. If it becomes clear that the lack of specificity regarding how impacts are measured is a problem, the Task Force recommends that the issue be revisited. There may be benefit to developing a standard methodology for measuring the types of impacts outlined in the code.

Mitigation: Task Force members expressed concern that although the code calls for mitigation measures to address adverse social and economic impacts, it does not provide specifics as to when mitigation measured are triggered, how much mitigation should be required, or what measures are appropriate. The Task Force drew the following conclusions:

• It would be very difficult and perhaps impractical to codify specifics regarding mitigation because all projects are different. While the idea of having a nice handy “cookbook” is appealing and reassuring on some levels, it could serve to “handcuff” both the City and the applicant by reducing flexibility and creativity and making it more difficult to end up with a good project that has maximum benefits to the City.
• The Task Force recommends that the City develop a working list of appropriate and acceptable types of mitigation measures that can be used in negotiations with the applicant.

Are Code Changes Needed Now? The Task Force came to the conclusion that Code changes are not needed at this time. It reached this conclusion for the following reasons:

• The Community and Economic Impact Standards contained in the code are general in nature and primarily outline the impacts to be measured. While many think it would be nice to have a more specific blueprint to guide the City through the decision making process, the Task Force concluded that there are benefits associated with not getting too specific.
• The staff has received a draft of the first CEIS produced under this section of the code. The draft was summarized for the task force and the group used the summary to take a first look at whether the Code was asking applicants the right questions. In short, the Task Force found nothing in the first CEIS to make it believe that the Code needed to be changed at this time.
• It was the general feeling of the Task Force that it is too early to contemplate Code changes. So far, the City has little or no experience with how the new community and economic impact standards will work in the field. The Task Force recommends that the City get some experience with how the new standards work before it launches into code revisions.

RECOMMENDATIONS

The Community and Economic Impact Standards Task Force recommends the following to the Homer City Council:

1. Sections 21.61.105 (f) and 21.61.105 (L) (2) of the Municipal Code should not be amended at this time. The Task Force recommends that the City wait to see how these sections of the code actually work in practice before contemplating changes.
2. The Task Force recommends that the Council direct the City Manager to properly format and insert the policy recommendations contained herein into a draft amendment to the Planning Commission Policies and Procedures Manual, provide the proposed amendment to the Manual to the Planning Commission for review, and submit the Commission’s recommendations to the Council for final approval.
3. The Task Force recommends that the Council ask the City Manager to provide it with a progress report no later than August 8, 2006 which describes how the Community and Economic Impacts Standards are working in practice. The report should include any identified problem areas and suggested fixes.

3. The Task Force recommends that the Council direct the City Manager to provide the Planning Commission with a progress report including recommendations for Code changes, if necessary, after the first permitting process under the new standards is completed. The Task Force recommends further that the Planning Commission be requested to submit its recommendations to the Council after a thorough review of the report.

4. The Task Force considers its work to be complete and recommends that the City Council terminate it.