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<br />affordable, and to begin work on needed sports and recreation facilities to
<br />give our young people alternatives to drugs and deviant behavior.
<br />
<br />The third piece of my agenda for 1990 cuts into the heart of this community.
<br />That is the renaissance of downtown. Now some people may think I have an axe
<br />to grind, and they're right, I do. It isn't that I own property downtown,
<br />because I do not. It isn't that my office is downtown, because it isn't.
<br />It's not even that I go downtown shopping a lot, because I don't. I have no
<br />vested interest in downtown, and yet as a citizen of this community, I have a
<br />heavy stake in the future of Eugene's downtown, and so do you, and so do all
<br />the citizens in Eugene.
<br />
<br />The downtown is the centerpiece of Eugene's civic, economic, and cultural
<br />future because the downtown is where 15,000 people come and work. The down-
<br />town is where tourists will spend time and spend money. Downtown is where
<br />investors go to take a community's pulse. Downtown is where you should find
<br />the largest buildings; your best shopping; your finest restaurants; your
<br />premier entertainment; and your greatest density of people, traffic, and
<br />transit. When offices, retailers, and other residents leave downtown for
<br />outlying areas, two things happen. First, we all pay an in visible tax for
<br />the increased expense of providing police, fire, and infrastructure to the
<br />outlying areas. Second, we contribute to urban sprawl, and create the danger
<br />that Eugene could become a city like Los Angeles.
<br />
<br />What are we going to do with our downtown? It's really our decision, but
<br />believe me, we have problems: the Tiffany building, empty; Sears, empty;
<br />poor vehicle access; The Bon building at Valley River; the Guard buying
<br />property out in north Eugene; Pankow project withdrawing; retail vacancies
<br />are up; in constant dollars there is less profit downtown than there happened
<br />to be a decade ago; and the urban renewal referendum creates uncertainty
<br />about our downtown's future.
<br />
<br />Have you ever wondered about the phrase, "Nero fiddled while Rome burned?" I
<br />have thought of that in working on this speech because watching what is
<br />happening downtown helped me understand what that means. You see, we cannot
<br />fiddle as the future of our downtown burns. Now Nero got a bum rap. The
<br />fact is, the legend about Nero fiddling while Rome burned was trumped up by
<br />his enemies, but still people ask, "Where was Nero?" As mayor, I'm not going
<br />to fiddle while the future of our downtown burns. I'm not going to do it.
<br />I'm not going to have people asking, "Where was Miller?" I want people to
<br />remember that Miller was saying, "Stop arguing. Start agreeing. Stop argu-
<br />ing. Start agreeing. Save downtown while there is still a downtown to
<br />save."
<br />
<br />If you think I'm being alarmist, take a walk downtown. Walk past Sears--va-
<br />cant. Center Court, Lerner's, the old Equitable building. And as you walk,
<br />think about this: until recently, the center of old downtown at Broadway and
<br />Willamette had vacancies on each corner, and the Equitable building has been
<br />empty for six years. And then ask yourself, "Doesn't each new vacancy give
<br />the retailers who remain one more reason to leave?" If we allow the trend to
<br />slowly erode downtown, we could easily have a downtown that looks like Akron,
<br />Ohio, where I have been and lived. You don't want it to look like that. Or
<br />Shreveport, Louisiana, where we walked around there seeing all the boarded up
<br />shops and the deserted areas.
<br />
<br />STATE OF THE CITY ADDRESS: MAYOR JEFF MILLER
<br />
<br />January 8, 1990
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<br />Page 6
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