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Last week’s decision was made while two councilors were absent and required a tie-breaking vote from the mayor. It would add $800,000 in costs. The council decided to take another look at the idea in June.
The Eugene City Council has decided to revisit its April 8 split vote to add three new economic development positions, costing $800,000 per year.
The council last week voted 3-3 to add the staff — more than doubling the size of City Hall’s economic workforce team — after about 30 minutes of discussion at the end of its work session, according to a meeting recording. Two councilors were absent, so the mayor cast a tiebreaker vote. Council and staff didn’t discuss the budget tradeoffs that may come with adding the positions.
At Monday’s council meeting, April 13, Councilor Lyndsie Leech directed the city manager to schedule a follow-up discussion and provide more information on the proposal on June 8, during a financial planning work session that will center on the city’s unfunded needs.
“Adding such an amount to our budget needs to be decided by more than three members of this council,” she said. “We can come back to this topic and discuss it further, get a little bit more information and put it next to other things that we are considering to place into our budget.”
Leech and Councilor Eliza Kashinsky, who seconded the motion, voted “no” on the motion to add staff last week. Monday’s vote to revisit it was 5-3, with councilors Mike Clark, Greg Evans and Randy Groves in opposition.
“It seems a little too close to reconsideration, when, in my opinion, what we did in our last action was critically important to the long-term future of our city,” Clark said.
Interim City Manager Matt Rodrigues said the city would “include mention of those positions throughout the long-range financial planning process” regardless of the vote, but it ensures a discussion on the additional staff will be part of the June 8 work session.
