Urban Renewal is in the air. We've discussed it here a little in response to a note at our Strong Towns Group, and on Monday Council will receive a summary overview.
 |
| Two slides from the URA report |
For each URA there's a list of recent "key accomplishments." The lists show some of the range of projects urban renewal funding supports. It's a good start to reporting and does show that the way Salem uses URA funding currently is far from old-school "slum clearance" style Urban Renewal.
But the lists also give selective detail. The amount of URA funding is not given, nor a proportion to total project cost. The downtown slide shows the New Holman Hotel, but that is also in an Opportunity Zone and there are multiple, stacked incentives and subsidies in play for it. Is it really a success for Urban Renewal? Some projects are developer incentives to make difficult projects simply happen, some are more likely developer slush, some are City capital projects. It would be helpful to know about the proportions of each, and some judgements about when incentives were actually essential. That Park Front Office building was definitely a non-essential instance, an instance of slush.
Critically, the summaries don't give any assessment for whether Urban Renewal works for each area (as distinct from funding a shopping list of projects). The City still refuses to report on the initial tax base inside the URA, the appreciation in value of nearby property over the relevant time interval, and the new tax base inside the URA. Does it in fact boost the total value of the URA? Does the tax increment represent anything more than citywide appreciation in value?
Who knows!
At least on the now closed Pringle Creek URA, it certainly looked like the URA's assessed value failed to surpass doing nothing. It underperformed inflation!
What the City does say, as I read it, is that in a hypothetical, if you closed all the URAs (which I don't think is possible since they have debt to service), the City would receive about $6.7 million annually in property tax revenue that currently gets redirected to the the URAs. So that's the gap they create for the City.
There are a few interesting bits, among them the start and end dates for each area.
The City established the downtown URA in 1975 and it's now scheduled to close in 2041.
By contrast, the City established the North Gateway URA in 1990 and it's scheduled to close in 2026.
The West Salem URA has dates of 2001 - 2027.
McGilchrist URA has dates of 2007 - 2024.
Just generally our Urban Renewal scheme needs more analysis and discussion. By itself the item at Council is insufficient, but maybe it will get things started.
 |
| Four Transportation items in Report |
There's a Climate Action Plan annual report for 2023. We've already remarked on most of these of interest here.
The TSP has promise, but there is nothing public-facing yet. The Climate Friendly Areas process has been a sham, however, and that should raise concerns about the TSP process.
The passivity on the DEQ commute trip reduction rules is odd. There is plenty the City could already be doing on its own without waiting, but the pattern with the Climate Action Plan has been to wait for directions from the State and to let that drive any City process. The City is reactive and passive rather than proactive.
 |
| Yay for parking reform! |
But the City is doing the work on parking reform, and that should be celebrated.
- Notes on the Climate Friendly Areas process under Salem in Motion
- Notes on the Climate Action Plan
 |
| Congestion/idling not related to emissions (City Observatory) |
One of the items in the progress report on the Sustainable Cities Residency is a project in support of the Climate Action Plan, “The Lowest Hanging Cherry - Stop Idling.”
An adult in the room really needed to step in and redirect the students to something actually useful. It is painful to be so critical of a student project, but this campaign very well could be harmful and set back our climate efforts.
Idling in and of itself is not a great problem, and focusing on it will lead to disproportionate efforts on a secondary problem.
Moreover, the discourse on idling will be co-opted by those who want more capacity as a solution to congestion. And more capacity will induce more trips.
The solution on emissions is not "don't idle." It is rather, "don't drive."
 |
| Driving is the biggest source (Annual Report) |
Any PR campaign on transportation, our greatest source of emissions, needed to be oriented to less driving and shorter trips, to VMT reduction.
(Note that the strategy discussed in the Climate Action Plan Annual Report, TL 21, is for "commute trip reduction" not "commute idling reduction.")
The winter projects hopefully will be better.
Another PR/education project to boost heat pump adoption sounds much more promising. A project for siting EV chargers in the public right-of-way could be useful. And a project on walkability assessments will be very interesting to see.
- Previously on this SCI Residency.
 |
| Spec Keene Stadium and John Lewis Field (WU) |
This is not very important, but it sounds like great fun. The City, Willamette University, and a group, the Salem Baseball Club LLC, propose to execute a formal Memorandum of Understanding to start negotations on renovating Spec Keene Stadium for a college wood bat summer league team. It doesn't say the West Coast League, but that is very possible.
The City is not being asked for any direct subsidy, but to cooperate with adjustments on easements, as the current field encroaches on City-owned property.
What's not to like?! Hillsboro and Eugene are currently struggling with the cost to build new stadiums that meet MLB standards for minor league clubs. $100 million is in round figures what they are talking about.
If Willamette and the Salem Baseball Club can reach agreement on improvements, these are sure to cost much, much less and to offer just as much summer fun.
 |
| July 10th, 1921 |
Spec Keene, coach at Willamette and then Athletic Director at OSU, and our baseball history also, probably deserve a revival. Just after he graduated from college, he was locally famous enough to lead the ad for a summer baseball game at Oxford Park.
- "Salemites Saw Negro League Star and Hall of Famer Bullet Rogan in 1921 at Long-gone Oxford Park" (2021)
- "At Oxford Park site Ericksons Supermarket building now home to Fitts Seafood and Santiam Wine" (2021)
A newspaper search for him turns up over 3000 articles. He was in the sports pages often, and not infrequently even on the front page.
 |
| April 20th, 1941 |
Famously he was with the Willamette team at Pearl Harbor.
 |
| December 7th, 1941 |
Then at OSU he led the efforts for Gill Coliseum and Parker Stadium (now Reser Stadium).
As SCAN and the Historic Landmarks Commission work on the "heritage neighborhood" project, there are opportunities also to knit more narrative history into any ballfield and stadium renovation.
Bundled with the baseball project is proposed work on the softball field at Tokyo International directly east of the Amtrak and Greyhound stations. The School District appears to have interest in playing on both baseball and softball fields, and there are potential additional community benefits to all this working out.
 |
| Why delete "transportation"? |
Briefly, in the updated Legislative agenda, the State priorities has an odd strike-through, deleting transportation from "carbon-reducing projects." Why? Since transportation is our greatest source, this seems like reasonable direction, and the deletion is a little suspicious.
 |
| We got it, $2.8 million, right? |
And it's not updated with the $2.8 million award for Vision Zero and Twenty is Plenty.
 |
| Liberty and Davis Roads S. |
Finally, there's an item to accelerate a new traffic signal and other intersection work on Liberty and Davis Roads S as part of the bond project list. It's right by Crossler Middle School and probably there's some crosswalk work in it. Hopefully it will include provision for speed reduction also, as it is increasingly urbanized, is near the bad intersection with Mildred Lane, and we need to stop treating Liberty here like a zoomy rural road. It appears to be posted for 45mph with some "advisory" sections of 35mph. This is much too fast.
Since we know now we will have a Vision Zero plan, are we designing new road projects under Vision Zero principles? Like, we don't have to wait for the plan, right? We know there's stuff we can already do to anticipate it.
Or are we going to wait, like we are waiting on the DEQ commute trip reduction rules?
No comments:
Post a Comment