La Grande City Council sets priorities for upcoming fiscal year during annual retreat
Jan. 25—LA GRANDE — The La Grande City Council outlined its priorities for the upcoming fiscal year during the annual retreat with city staff on Tuesday, Jan. 24.
Staffing levels, a new facility for the La Grande Police Department, possible revisions to the election process and updated emergency plans emerged as areas of interest for the council.
"Tonight's a fairly ambitious list of topics to run through," City Manager Robert Strope said.
No official decisions or votes can be conducted during the retreat. The evening serves as an opportunity for members of the council to collaborate on ideas with city staff, which will then become a point of emphasis during budget development for the 2023-24 fiscal year.
Staffing levels
Recruitment and retention of employees throughout the city's departments was a big focus of the retreat.
La Grande is in the final year of a three-year-long collective bargaining agreements with represented groups and will be bargaining with the three unions representing the police department, fire department and employees association. The negotiations will be effective in June.
"One of the things we are really having a difficult time doing is recruiting firefighter paramedics," Strope said.
In March, councilors will have the opportunity to discuss removing or reducing the current residency requirements for firefighters. Currently, firefighters are required to live within 15 air miles of the city. In an effort to recruit people from farther away, the council will consider adjusting the requirement to 100 travel miles.
Strope said that because the fire department operates on a 48/96 shift — where firefighters work for 48 hours then are off for 96 hours — it opens up the possibility for people to commute from areas like Pendleton and Hermiston for their shift. Not having to relocate could generate more interest in the positions, considering housing costs and interest rates, he said.
Councilor Denise Wheeler was concerned about whether firefighter paramedics are paid enough.
"There are a lot of elements in the retention and recruiting. Paramedics are just in short supply. That's a big piece of it. And so if they don't have a tie to our area, a small town, then pay is a piece of that puzzle, but it's not the entire thing," Fire Chief Emmitt Cornford said.
He went on to say that even if La Grande was able to get closer to the pay equity for smaller departments, they are never going to be able to compete with places like Portland, which has the tax base and ability to pay more.
New police station under consideration
Councilors had a few options to consider for how to move forward this year with the police department's need for a new station.
La Grande Police Chief Gary Bell walked the council through the history of the current shared space used by both the police department and Union County Sheriff's Office. The two agencies began sharing a building in 1980 and Bell said it was the right decision at the time. However, he does not feel like it would be the right choice now as both entities operate full-sized law enforcement agencies.
"Before we moved the police department up on the hill, we were downtown," Bell said. "That is a good model and we know that. Around America, we recognize having our police department in the core downtown is a wise thing to do (but) I do not want our jail downtown."
Based on a preliminary analysis of the police department's current and future needs, Bell said ideally the new building would be around 13,000 square feet. However, he would like to see a professional consultant brought on for the project, which Bell estimated could be in the range of $50,000 to $75,000.
"I have never built a police department," he said. "I can tell you what I think that we would need, but we're talking about something of such importance that if we were able to launch this and see something like this through completion, it would transcend all of our public service if we did it right."
Topics for further discussion
The city council will discuss possible changes to the election process in greater detail during a future work session. The disscussion will consider the benefits and drawbacks of changing council elections to an at-large voting system or another system in which all the council candidates are in a single pool and the ones with the most votes are elected to the open seats. Currently, candidates run for a specific seat on the council, but those seats have no real distinction from one another.
This change could help reduce confusion for both candidates and voters. It also could lessen the adversarial nature of the elections. It would, however, remove the element of a candidate running with the intent to face off against an incumbent or specific opponent.
Another topic that will be discussed in greater detail will be La Grande's emergency operation plan, which hasn't been updated since the 1990s. The city will publish a call for proposals to help create a comprehensive plan. Councilors will decide how to move forward with the project after reviewing proposals.
Strope also relayed his top priorities for the year — street and road infrastructure, housing, economic development, staffing, fiscal management, general fund capital improvements, mapping of the city's updated floodplains and emergency operation plan updates.
Isabella Crowley is a reporter for The Observer. Contact her at {span}541-624-6014 or{/span} icrowley@lagrandeobserver.com.
