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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 28, 1999)
Historic quality of downtown spared with new building site ■ Letters and e-mail give voice to residents’ opposition of downtown building site By Brian Goodell Oregon Daily Emerald Pressures from community members and Congressman Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., have prompted the Eugene City Council to sup port the development of a $70 million feder al courthouse in place of city hall, rather than the more controversial site next to the Fifth Street Public Market. At an impromptu Thursday night meet ing, the council also formed a committee to recommend a plan for relocating current city hall operations to a new location should the city hall site be adopted. Ac cording to DeFazio, the General Services Administration, the federal agency that initially chose the Fifth Avenue site, is anxious for the committee to begin its analysis. “The council considers this a win-win situation,” City Communications Director Phil Weiler said. “They saw this as an op portunity to get out of a building that is too small and would crumble in an earth quake.” In addition, the GSA will avoid public scrutiny for dropping a gigantic, 10-story federal courthouse in the middle of down town Eugene’s commercial district next to the Fifth Street Public Market. DeFazio’s office and the City Manager’s office re ceived several hundred letters and e-mail messages from Eugene residents voicing their disdain for the GSA’s original pro posed site. “The character of downtown Eugene is important to residents and visitors,” Uni versity employee Kim Mangun wrote in one of several hundred letters sent to May or Jim Torrey. “Residents appreciate the quaint and historic nature of the area, and visitors bring in much-needed revenue to Station Square, Fifth Street Public Market and the Pearl District. What a shame it would be to erect such an enormous build ing that would overshadow the rest of downtown.” However, no official site has been cho sen. According to a Sept. 23 Register Guard article, Jay Pearson, the regional ad ministrator of the GSA, said his decision was final last week and came after consid ering comments from two public meetings and a year-long analysis of three down town sites. But in a telephone conversation on Fri day, DeFazio informed Torrey that the GSA is reconsidering its site selection for the new federal courthouse. “The GSA’s original decision was based on what they thought was in the public’s best interest,” Weiler said. “So there’s no reason why they wouldn’t reconsider putting a 10-story building on Fifth Av enue. It would wipe out all surface lot parking, block out the sun and change the overall feel of that part of town.” The tally of the council’s vote was six to one, with Councilor Gary Rayor as the lone opposition vote. According to the motion, the council agreed that the Fifth Avenue site presents significant challenges of scale, compatibility and neighborhood im pact. Weiler said the council also took into consideration the need for a new city hall. However, their concerns did not appear in the text of the motion. “When city hall was built 35 years ago, building codes were different than they are now,” Weiler said. “Back then, people didn’t know that the Willamette Valley had earth quakes.” Jeffrey Stockton/ Emerald The proposed site for the new federal building is now City Hall, located downtown on 7th Avenue E. St. Qipmas'More Catholic Newman Center... f JMItout; iflairv | Newman Center: 1850 Emerald Street, across from Hayward Field Phone: 346-4468 newman@efn.org http://www.efn.org/~newman/ Student Masses: Sunday 7:30PM, Wednesday 9PM Free pasta feed 9/26 at 5-7 pm Student Retreat 10/15 10/17