CCMIN052008 - Laserfiche WebLink

Councilmember McGovern questioned how long development would be held up if the City developed a hillside or grading ordinance through aCity-initiated process, and City Manager Fialho said it would not be consistent with the way the City addresses its ordinance and he believed it could take 6-12 months. Mayor Hosterman believed we could have language that re- affirms language in the General Plan in order to give people the opportunity to say yes to a deliberative process versus future Councils having to grapple with bad language. City Manager Fialho said he heard Councilmember Cook-Kallio say, a measure to an alternative that would describe a process that eventually would be ratified by the voters, but Mayor Hosterman say, can you put up by way of a measure, existing General Plan policies in place as an alternative to the Initiative, which are two different things. He said this can be done and can be part of the 30- day process, if directed to do so. Councilmember McGovern felt if the Council uses what the public has put forth and better define items, it would augment the Initiative. Councilmember Sullivan believes there is a split community on these issues, there is a right and wrong way to do this, we need information from the report to make a decision, and his original thought about a task force was to bring people together to arrive at an implementing ordinance and Initiative authors would like to participate in this. But, if we put something competing on the ballot, we would drive a wedge between those authors and aCouncil-driven process. Councilmember Cook-Kallio said Council could put something on the ballot that clarified the Council's intent which could include stakeholder comments. Councilmember Sullivan confirmed that this process could be done prior to putting something else on the ballot in order to have a cooperative measure. Councilmember McGovern supported coming back in a way that is not competing but rather an adjunct to what Initiative the people put forward. Mayor Hosterman said understanding the language in the Initiative cannot be changed, it will either be adopted by the Council or it will be placed on the ballot. For the Council to have an opportunity to have a deliberative process that is all inclusive, she believes we should ask staff to come up with language opportunities that would allow the Council to do this and would make clear to the community the Council's intent is to put together a hillside ordinance that we can implement and that future Councils can support. She confirmed with Councilmembers that they were amenable to looking at the language opportunities to use on the November ballot as well as directing staff to prepare a report. Vice Mayor Thorne confirmed there were time limitations to place an item on the ballot and supported putting something on the ballot that defines a process and identifies the Council's intent. Councilmember Sullivan said the entire ordinance would not need to be developed by the time it needed to go on the ballot, but rather work through issues of consistency and work with the stakeholder group, because he was not supportive of a competing measure. Mayor Hosterman said she does not want a competing measure but wants to engage the entire community in the process. She does not think this can be done in the next 30 days, but the City can put additional language on the ballot which gives people the opportunity for people to go in a different direction and she believed this is important. City Manager Fialho voiced caution in how the City approaches it, as it is bound by CEQA laws. He confirmed that the Council wants, in addition to the Section 9212 analysis, to come up with conceptual ideas for how there might be a complimentary and alternative measure that further refines the Initiative which the Council can debate and discuss when the matter returns in June. He suggested holding off on the City Attorney presenting an impartial analysis, as this is difficult without a Section 9212 report. City Council Minutes 15 May 20, 2008