Community Reinvestment Plan - (Draft of Community Reinvestment Plan for discussion only). 

Review and provide direction regarding "Community Reinvestment Plan - Draft November 2014" which includes:

1. Community Reinvestment Policy - Draft
2. Objectives - Draft
3. Implementation Strategies - Draft

COUNCIL GOALS:




11. Effective governance

REGIONAL PLAN:


The Flagstaff Regional Plan 2030 includes a series of goals and policies that support community reinvestment as an objective and course of action to achieve the goals and policies of the Plan.  These include goals less directly seeking reinvestment such as preserving resources and open spaces, efficient infrastructure, energy efficiency, urban land-uses and development patterns, and multimodal commuting.  However, the Plan also directly calls for compact development, investing in existing neighborhoods and urban areas, adaptive re-use, historic preservation, and promoting infill and redevelopment.

BACKGROUND:
At a Work Session on October 29, 2013, the City Council provided the most recent direction that serves as the basis of this draft of the Community Reinvestment Policy.  The presentation included an overview of many available options and consideration was given to some "stage setting" concepts and prerequisite decision points.  The City Council concurred that the Community Reinvestment Policy, by virtue of its very nature, would give reinvestment projects an advantage over greenfield projects and that the policy should be an overarching policy instead of targeting any specific neighborhoods (traditional redevelopment districts)..  The City Council acknowledged the necessary financial commitment and provided direction on some of the possible implementation strategies that had less consensus among the various stakeholders.  Direction was also provided regarding objectives and implementation strategies that the City Council was not interested in pursuing such as planning, impact fees, and land banking.  Finally, there was agreement that generally reduced development requirements, permit processing timeframes, and fee waivers do not have potential to yield meaningful incentives for reinvestment.  The materials last reviewed by the City Council are attached.

Since that time, staff has modified the plan per City Council direction and carefully reviewed and discussed the plan amongst the impacted staff.  For City Council consideration, please find attached a draft Community Reinvestment Plan developed from that direction and discussion.

ABOUT THE DRAFT:
The overall framework of the draft plan is that the potential policy and objectives are reflections of City Council, community, stakeholder, and staff input as to what the overarching policy should (or could) be.  However, for the purposes of the current Work Session discussion, the City Council should consider the potential implementation strategies as a "menu" of possibilities that can be evaluated for viability and edited or deleted prior to adoption of any specific implementation action.

THE USE OF DISTRICTS:
Recall that the available “redevelopment district” options are limited and ineffective as the State laws have been modified through the years.  On that basis, the focus of this plan has been on broad policies, objectives, goals, and implementation strategies.  However, the Regional Plan 2030 identifies existing activity centers and corridors as desirable redevelopment foci.  And, several of the implementation strategies, like any alternative “urban engineering standards”, would be best accomplished on a geographical basis.  So while we’ve been trying to avoid requirements such as declaring neighborhoods as “slum and blight”, at the end of the day, creating districts is most likely a part of accomplishing the objectives.  Specifically, the “Infill Incentive District” is likely the tool to be used to calibrate the codes and standards to these areas and most likely to be included in specific implementation actions that staff would bring forward for City Council adoption.

PREDICTABILITY:
Please recall from prior discussions that "predictability" is an important character trait of the development process.  One of the disadvantages of typical reinvestment is that the work, the requirements, are less predictable.  Many of the concepts of this plan are concerned with establishing a more predictable environment in a reinvestment scenario.

FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS:
General thoughts on the financial implications are included in the annotations of the draft plan.  As the implementation strategies are developed, more detailed cost understandings can be developed.  Note that the most impactful strategies herein also have the highest associated costs and no funding mechanism has been identified.

Just developing these strategies has cost implications including staff time, or hiring consultants or additional staff.  Other projects could experience delay as staff develops these strategies.  The direction provided by the City Council will be constructive to include and prioritize these efforts within various work programs.