Sunday, April 1, 2012

Fairview Refinement Plan Unchanged, Still Looks Conventional

Sometimes the City just makes you go "huh?"

Tuesday night the Planning Commission reconvenes to continue the matter of the third refinement plan for a part of the former Fairview hospital.

The "huh" part?

The refinement plan doesn't seem to have changed. All that's changed in the new staff report is a retrenchment. The staff report is titled "Staff Report Amending Findings Addressing SRC...;Consistency of FRP12-01 with the Fairview Plan."

Rather than urging a better plan, staff seems to have returned with longer and more baroque rationalization for a flawed plan.

Indeed, the Morningside Neighborhood Association doesn't find the plan compliant either, and with a strong statement the board voted 12-1 to oppose the plan as it is written:
Morningside N.A. Board recommends to the Salem Planning Commission that, because so many Fairview Master Plan policies and Standards are not being followed, the applicant be asked to bring these plans into conformance with the policies contained in the Fairview Master Plan...
Hopefully the plan will be returned to the developer for substantive revision.

(Perhaps I'll return to this in more detail, but the sadness of yesterday's news makes temperate critique more difficult - so that's all for now.)

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