NEWS
Emerald Meadows is a nice bit of county-owned acreage
out at Buford Park where Faerieworlds has been held the
last couple of years. We hear the county is planning on
improving the site, maybe bringing in electrical power and
even adding RV hook-ups in order to accommodate music
festivals and other big events. The Cascadia Music Festival
has booked the site for July 5 and is starting to sell tickets
this week at cascadiamusicfestival.com Headlining the
event will be Bruce Hornsby, Railroad Earth, Tony Furtado,
Jelly Bread and more. The festival hopes to grow to three
days next year. Faerieworlds, by the way, will be July 26-28
this year. The Dirty Dash mud run obstacle course is also at
the site, this year June 29-30.
Lane County’s fourth annual Spring Propagation Fair
will be from 11 am to 3 pm Saturday, March 23, at the
LCC main campus cafeteria. The event is free and open to
the public, made possible by a volunteer effort to support
home orchardists, vegetable gardeners and native plant
enthusiasts in and around the southern Willamette Valley.
See springpropagationfair.com
Party@Jo’s is the latest “Westraunt Concept” from
the West Brothers in Eugene. The restaurant attached to
Dickie Jo’s Burgers on Valley River Way across from the
mall is designed to accommodate evening dinner parties
and afternoon kid events, such as birthday parties. The
restaurant opened March 6 and can be contacted at 912-
9091.
We hear Level Up Arcade at 13th and Oak west of
campus is planning to expand into the old Cornucopia Maize
Lounge space next door, sometime soon. Level Up has
arcade games, old and new, along with a bar and restaurant.
See leveluparcade.com
Need a small, cheap offi ce downtown with wi-fi , a
meeting space and a group of friendly lefties to rub elbows
with and share a bathroom and kitchenette? The nonprofi t
Helios Resource Network has a cubicle available at 120 W.
Broadway. Email Cary at cdt@efn.org
Hummingbird Wholesale in Eugene has gotten attention
in this column in the past, and here’s more. The innovative
bulk food distributor and food business incubator has
earned national recognition from Green America’s People
& Planet Awards for businesses that “deeply integrate
environmental and social considerations in their strategies
and operations.” Green America is a nonprofi t that promotes
ethical consumerism. Kristie Steele of Hummingbird says
the $5,000 prize will be used to purchase a second electric
bike cart for use in local deliveries.
Plant Nerd Night begins at 6 pm Thursday, March 28, at
the Eugene Garden Club, 1645 High St., and nursery folks
from Territorial Seed, Bloom River Gardens, Doak Creek,
Dancing Lizard and Johnson Brothers will be there to show
off their plants and share their expertise. The event is free
but raffl e tickets will be sold to help fund local civic and
youth gardening projects.
Hop Valley Brewing received a Regional Award of
Merit for Economic Enhancement at a recent Lane Council
of Governments member appreciation dinner at LCC. Hop
Valley operates a restaurant and brewery in Springfi eld
and is planning a 30,000 sq. ft. facility in the Whiteaker
neighborhood that will include a tasting room. Two of Hop
Valley’s founders, Ron Howard and Jonas Kungys, accepted
the award.
A second Togo’s sandwich shop opened March 16 on
West 11th at Seneca. The fi rst of the West Coast franchises
in Lane County opened in January at 954 Pearl St. See
togoseugene.com
NO CITIZEN INPUT ON
CITY HALL ARCHITECT
City Hall may be fenced-off, padlocked and dormant,
but seven proposals in response to the city’s request for
proposals (RFP) from architects show that the process of
redesigning and rebuilding the award-winning structure has
begun. City Manager Jon Ruiz will announce fi nalists March
29 and is expected to select the winning fi rm (or fi rms) by
April 12, after evaluating the applications on a points scale
with city staff.
The lack of a citizens committee to guide the selection
process irks some Eugeneans, including Kevin Matthews,
editor of ArchitectureWeek. “This is a project of a type
and a scope for which the city of Eugene has in the past
traditionally assembled a citizen committee to provide input
on reviewing the applications,” Matthews says.
“The hiring of fi rms to do jobs for the city comes under
the job of the city manager,” Mayor Kitty Piercy says. She
says that Ruiz told her that the City Council will be able
to give him input in the selection. “We have talked and he
wants this to be as open and engaging a process for the
council as possible,” she says.
Piercy says that every city should have a city hall, and
getting back into Eugene’s own building is a priority. “It’s
very important to me that we not be out of a city hall for too
long,” she says, and she hopes to keep “as close to the two-
year timeline as possible.”
Matthews says that the city’s RFP raised a couple of red
fl ags for him, especially the portion that calls for a design
that “favors new construction to the extent possible” beyond
the council chambers, public art and parking. “That’s the
opposite of sustainable,” Matthews says. He thinks that
a citizens committee could better refl ect what the public
wants in its City Hall architect, including higher standards
for sustainability and honoring what he calls one of the
Willamette Valley’s best examples of mid-century modern
architecture. “For the city to be only requiring LEED
silver is a low bar for sustainability,” he says, citing the
LEED platinum and gold buildings that LCC constructed
downtown.
Retired architect Dan Herbert says he hopes the design
chosen refl ects the need for a building that will last.
“Any serious proposal would pay strong attention to the
implications of a hundred year building,” he says, including
the ability to easily update electric, heating and cooling
systems and other internal workings.
At this phase, Matthews says, responses to the requests
for proposals aren’t very detailed, typically a 25- to 50-page
ACTIVIST
• A new group, Students Against Imperialism, has formed
after a recent speaking event in which two controversial Israeli
soldiers came to speak at UO. “The need to challenge imperialism
is dire, as the United States is the world’s leading colonial
power,” reads a statement from the group. The group is focusing
on a range of issues, from immigration policy to “Israel’s war
machine.” For more information, email uoregon.sai@gmail.com
lighten up
BY RAFAEL ALDAVE
The other paper in town reported that the proponents
of a county tax levy to run the jail said that the extra
money would “possibly cut the number of early releases
of jail inmates.” Well, that’s almost enough to make me
possibly consider voting for the measure.
POLLUTION UPDATE
The City of Eugene has referred Pacifi c Recycling to
the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ)
for enforcement regarding violations at its facility on Cross
Street near Roosevelt Boulevard. The referral concerns two
different Clean Water Act violations. First, Pacifi c Recycling
has failed to submit a plan to the city regarding how it will
reduce high pollution levels in stormwater discharges from
the site. The city has sent Pacifi c Recycling three separate
letters since November 2012 seeking such a plan, to no avail.
Second, Pacifi c Recycling has failed to submit a separate plan
to the city regarding how it will address signifi cant track out of
sediment from the site. The city notes that Pacifi c Recycling
has “demonstrated unwillingness to comply with” its Clean
Water Act permit, and that the violations are considered to be
signifi cant violations of Oregon environmental law.
DEQ sent Pacifi c Seafood a pre-enforcement notice
on Feb. 20 concerning Clean Water Act discharge
violations at two facilities in Newport, more specifi cally
for exceeding oil and grease and total suspended solids
levels in its permit. DEQ’s notice notes the repeated nature
of the violations over the last year. DEQ’s enforcement
databases indicate similar violations in Newport
dating back to at least 2009 (including a fi ne of almost
$8,000), as well as violations in Clatsop County in 2006.
— Doug Quirke/Oregon Clean Water Action Project
• The annual recruitment for Eugene city boards,
committees and commissions is now under way. Vacancies are
coming up on the Budget Committee, Planning Commission,
Civilian Review Board and several others. Deadline for
applications is March 29. See eugene-or.gov/bcc or stop by the
city manager’s office.
• Beyond Toxics and supporters are traveling to in Salem for
the first public hearing of HB 3364, the Safe Public Places Act,
at 8 am Thursday, March 28. The bill was written by Beyond
Toxics and outlines a “well-thought out approach to pest
management.” See safepublicplaces.org for more information.
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10
LERT
notebook or bound package with descriptions of the fi rm
and its leaders, photographs of their relevant projects, an
outline how they would approach the project conceptually
and “blather” about integrated design, a key term in the RFP.
Proposals are not online, but the city’s purchasing offi ce
writes, “Interested parties can either come in to our offi ce to
view the fi le for free or they can request information through
a public records request process.” — Shannon Finnell
March 21 , 2013 • eugeneweekly.com
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