06/24/1987 Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

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Mr. Holmer said that one purpose of the Urban Renewal Plan is to increase the intensity of use downtown. He said that in the current Urban Renewal e District, this intensity is not high enough. He said expansion will work against the goal of promoting intensity of use. Ms. Ehrman asked whether the proposed expansion area is the same as it was when councilors took a tour of the area. Mr. Byrne said two changes have been made since the tour. He said that Martin Henner, the owner of some residential properties on 6th and Lincoln, objected to the inclusion of his properties in the district and said he would redevelop his properties without urban renewal assistance. Mr. Byrne said the Downtown and Planning commissions agreed to exclude the Henner properties from the proposed expansion area. He said the other change was that the Banana Warehouse property on 5th between Olive and Charnel ton was included in the expansion area. He said the owners of the half-block requested inclusion. He said they would like to redevelop the warehouse and have it designated as a historic property. The owners recently applied for, and were granted, a zone change to Whitaker Mixed Use. Mr. Byrne said this zoning will allow a broad variety of uses on the property. He said the owners have discussed having a brewery, a tavern, and some specialty retail on the property. Ms. Bascom asked how the size of the proposed expansion area was affected by the two changes made since the council's tour of the area. Mr. Byrne said the two changes resulted in a small increase in the expansion area's size. About a quarter-block remains available for future expansion. Referring to the fact that the district can be expanded no more than 20 percent beyond its original size, Ms. Bascom said Planning Commissioner John e Van Landingham had expressed the opinion that the proposed expansion should be as close to the 20 percent limit as possible. Mr. Byrne said the Downtown Commission felt strongly that some of the 20 percent limit should be reserved in order to preserve the flexibility to expand in the future in reponse to a development. He said this is precisely what occurred with the Banana Warehouse property. This property was not part of the original proposed expansion area; but when the owners said they wanted to develop the property and wanted to be included in the Urban Renewal District, the commissions decided to include the property in the expansion area in order to make the urban renewal tools available to this proposed new development. Mr. Miller said his understanding was that staff and the two commissions evaluated the property surrounding the Urban Renewal District to determine whether any of it should be added to the district. He asked what the motivation for doing this was. Mr. Gleason said that across the nation, urban renewal is a tool to keep land from blighting. The classic definition of blighting is that a piece of land's development ratio ;s falling behind the development ratio of other lands in the community. He said the review of properties surrounding the Urban Renewal District was done in order to see whether the too 1 of urban renewa 1 should be applied to other parts of the downtown. Ms. Schue said she had never heard the notion that undeveloped 1 and is blighted; she asked staff to elaborate on this subject. Mr. Gleason said e MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 24, 1987 Page 5