City environmental services staff and the Metropolitan Wastewater Management Commission (MWMC) executive director briefed the council Tuesday on proposed updates to two foundational agreements: the MWMC intergovernmental agreement (IGA) and the operations-and-maintenance agreement (OMA).

Matt Stauter, environmental services director for Springfield and executive director of the MWMC, said both documents mainly need housekeeping edits: updated recitals and definitions, removal of obsolete historical references, consistent terminology and added language to allow the MWMC board to recommend on potential expansion areas. "Both agreements are in need of update," Stauter said.

Key technical changes under consideration include reducing a quorum requirement to a civil majority (four members when all jurisdictions are represented), clarifying the circumstances that trigger MWMC hearings (restricting hearings to MWMC business rather than any city matter), modernizing contract-delegation thresholds (the current threshold of $15,000 for some personal services requires board review; staff proposed deferring threshold-setting to the MWMC board), and updating indemnity, termination, dispute-resolution, public-records and asset-disposal language.

Stauter said MWMC legal counsel worked with Springfield and Eugene city attorneys and Lane County counsel on the draft, and that the MWMC board reviewed the proposal at its most recent meeting. Staff plans to return to the Springfield City Council with a resolution on Jan. 5, followed by consideration by Eugene and Lane County in January.

Councilors asked questions about the process, the history of edits and whether the MWMC board had seen the draft; Stauter said the board had reviewed it in its prior meeting. Councilors generally praised the effort as a necessary modernization of long-outdated language and supported the proposed process for bringing the agreements back for formal approval.

Next steps: staff will prepare a resolution for council consideration on Jan. 5 and coordinate review with Eugene and Lane County.