Forests_green_space

1:00:07 able to meet our current needs? Because to look at the growth and say, yeah, we want to expand into this particular area, build this community park. We want to build these pocket parks, which is great. But at the same time, if you can't fund what you have-- because I mean, what are we looking at for an acre for operating costs of a park? Yeah, I don't really have that. It's just off the top of my head. I remember it was a number I was like, wow, well, when you think about it, everything that goes into it, the number makes relative sense. So I think that's one of the concerns. And what I'm totally interested in moving forward to finding out this information, also, I think we have a bit of an identity issue, where folks don't quite realize that when you go to Frenchman's bar, you go to Vancouver Lake, this isn't just funded out of the city of Vancouver. You have Vancouver police arrive. You'll see VPD rolling up.

1:01:05 But where is this actually coming from? Because those parks are used-- they get a high usage, especially when you look at the covered areas, where you can have large families gather. So just my point, great job. Please move forward. Thank you, Mayor. Councilor Ty Stober? Thank you, Mayor, Council Member Ty Stober. So I think I've gotten this answered, but we'll continue to be interested to see how this matches with our charter's requirement that we have a Parks Department. And I'm not prescribing, just making sure that we're aware that we have something in our charter that says we have to have a Parks Department. The other thing is I look at the map. There are a lot of county properties, park properties, that exist outside of these urban growth areas.

1:02:03 And so wanting to understand how that plays in to this whole conversation. Thank you. Councilor Eric Paulsen? Thank you, Mayor. I'll say at the outset that I'm supportive of continuing the conversation, and I think that those are the correct three areas of work. And Ross, you said, look to the future with confidence. And I think that's an important anchoring point for this conversation because we all know that all of our jurisdictions are increasingly under significant revenue pressure. We are not keeping up with our expenditures. You had some data on that, but there's a lot more data that can be used to illustrate that point. We are in a budget year. When we get to the end of this budget year, inevitably there will have to be compromises made. And sadly, although we know that folks move here and stay here

1:03:01 because of the natural beauty and the parks, parks often is, as Council Member Harless mentioned, one of the things that is easy to make cuts in. And so sadly, it's one of the things that often is cut in challenging fiscal times. And for the foreseeable future, we're looking at challenging fiscal times. And so one of the things that I'm really excited about with this conversation is that it provides some additional revenue in the system to help buffer some of that. And I do think that the real trick here is going to be that interlocal agreement because we have different jurisdictions with different philosophies, different autonomous systems that they want to run their own way. We have different philosophies about who should get what. Some people feel that they should get exactly out of the system what they put into it. Others are a little bit more of a we're in this together. Sometimes it's, what is the time frame that we're talking about?

1:03:58 And whenever we have these interjurisdictional agencies, those are the kinds of conversations that we wind up in. We've been having those similar conversations around transit, for example. And so we've got communities that are emerging in vastly different ways, too. Vancouver is becoming increasingly urban. And you've heard some comments from some of my colleagues about the ways in which that manifests and how that affects our park standard. It's an urban park standard versus a suburban park standard versus a rural park standard. What are the needs financially and otherwise in the system? And then how can you then compare an urban park system to a non-urban park system and come up with an interlocal agreement that's equitable, that meets everybody's needs, understanding that everybody's needs are slightly different within this system. And so that's going to be a real trick. I'm optimistic that we can find a way to do that. Other jurisdictions have. We're not unique.

1:04:57 And having an urban area within a broader county that's not as urban-- King County is the same way. And so it can be done. I hope we can do it. It's going to take leadership. But ultimately, when we get through this conversation and we get to a solution that everybody can agree with, we're all going to be better off. Because as has been mentioned before and we mentioned at the outset, folks don't know where the city limits are when they go to a park. Wildlife doesn't know where the city limits are when they look for a place to build their nest or what have you. And so while it's good to remind folks that we have a system and there are different jurisdictions providing different services, in the end, what we want to have is a system where everybody has access to recreation and to parks and to green space that they can enjoy regardless of where they happen to live within the county. So thank you for the good work that's been done so far. And look forward to the ongoing conversation. Councilor Stover. Thank you, Mayor, Councilman Ty Stover. Again, the other thing I was thinking

1:05:55 is many times we look at these national benchmarks. And they're helpful, but they're not always practical. And so I would add to this list of things-- and maybe it's part of one of these three already-- but what is that target level that we're going to really shoot for, realistically, at least in the next 20 years? And so we can still push ourselves, but not feel overwhelmed that we're never going to achieve this national average, which I'd love to.