NORTHWEST
East Oregonian
A2
Saturday, June 22, 2019
Oregon intermodal proposals face further scrutiny
By MATEUSZ
PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
SALEM — Oregon
transportation officials are
currently leaning against
funding truck-to-rail inter-
modal projects aimed at
improving
agricultural
exports from the Willamette
and Treasure valleys.
However, the Oregon
Transportation
Commis-
sion has postponed making
a final decision on the pro-
posals for another month to
give sponsors more time to
answer questions in detail.
Information gaps about
the financial sustainability
of the intermodal facilities
are currently too large to
commit $25 million to either
of two competing proposals
in the Willamette Valley or
$26 million to the Treasure
Valley proposal, said Mat-
thew Garrett, director of
the Oregon Department of
Transportation.
“I cannot at this time rec-
ommend advancing any of
the three projects,” Garrett
said at the commission’s
June 20 meeting in Salem.
Rather than reject the
proposals outright, the
commission voted unani-
mously to extend the deci-
sion-making process until
its next meeting on July 18,
when more specifics about
Capital Press/Mateusz Perkowski, File
A container truck loaded with straw pulls away from a pressing facility owned by the Boshart
family in Salem. Straw is one of the agricultural exports that could benefit from an intermodal
facility that switches containers from trucks to rail in the mid-Willamette Valley. The facility is
intended to allow agricultural goods and other exports to bypass traffic congestion in Portland.
rail prices and service are
expected to be available.
“I’m not looking for cer-
tainty but we need more
confidence that it will be
viable,” said Tammy Baney,
the commission’s chair.
Oregon
lawmakers
authorized ODOT to spend
$51 million on the two facil-
ities in 2017, but an indepen-
dent transportation consul-
tant has since found that all
the proposals face substan-
tial challenges in operating
without subsidies.
“None of these projects
really control their own
destiny,” said Dan Smith,
principal of the Tioga
Group consulting firm.
“Neither yet has a viable
business plan.”
The intermodal facility
serving agricultural ship-
pers in the mid-Willamette
Valley would be based in
Brooks or farther south in
Millersburg, with the lat-
ter proposal winning tenta-
tive support from an ODOT
review committee earlier
this year.
Both proposals intend for
farm products, such as straw
and seeds, to be shipped
by rail from the mid-Wil-
lamette Valley, allow-
ing trucks to avoid traffic
in Portland on the way to
marine ports along Wash-
ington’s Puget Sound.
The Treasure Valley site
would allow onion produc-
Forecast for Pendleton Area
TODAY
SUNDAY
MONDAY
Warmer with some
sun
Partly sunny,
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81° 52°
76° 49°
TUESDAY
Partly sunny and
pleasant
WEDNESDAY
Nice with some
sun
Pleasant with
some sun
PENDLETON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
77° 49°
76° 48°
79° 49°
HERMISTON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
86° 58°
81° 53°
82° 52°
81° 52°
84° 57°
OREGON FORECAST
ALMANAC
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PENDLETON
through 3 p.m. yest.
HIGH
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TEMP.
Seattle
Olympia
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73/51
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Longview
Kennewick Walla Walla
81/56
Lewiston
69/54
86/57
Astoria
64/53
Pullman
Yakima 85/56
69/49
79/56
Portland
Hermiston
75/56
The Dalles 86/58
Salem
Corvallis
75/51
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La Grande
75/47
PRECIPITATION
John Day
Eugene
Bend
79/51
77/44
76/46
Ontario
82/55
Caldwell
Burns
72°
54°
81°
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100° (1970) 41° (2014)
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Albany
76/52
Boardman
Pendleton
Medford
85/53
Trace
Trace
0.46"
4.42"
5.10"
5.57"
WINDS (in mph)
77/52
75/44
0.04"
0.09"
0.93"
9.37"
6.49"
7.44"
through 3 p.m. yest.
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TEMP.
Pendleton 71/44
77/54
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
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HERMISTON
Enterprise
81/52
78/58
65°
49°
80°
53°
102° (1973) 34° (1893)
PRECIPITATION
Moses
Lake
69/53
Aberdeen
75/51
81/59
Tacoma
Yesterday
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Records
Spokane
Wenatchee
69/54
Today
Sun.
WSW 8-16
W 8-16
WSW 10-20
WSW 10-20
SUN AND MOON
Klamath Falls
78/42
Forecasts and graphics provided by AccuWeather, Inc. ©2019
Sunrise today
Sunset tonight
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Moonset today
5:06 a.m.
8:48 p.m.
12:02 a.m.
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Last
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ers to load their contain-
ers directly onto railcars in
Nyssa, rather than truck-
ing them to an intermodal
facility in Eastern Wash-
ington, which is meant to
reduce transportation costs
while boosting the region’s
economy.
The Tioga Group found
that proponents of the Trea-
sure Valley site may have
been “overly optimistic”
about how much volume
would move through the
facility, while the compet-
ing intermodal proposals
in the Willamette Valley
would have trouble operat-
ing profitably without subsi-
dies from ocean carriers.
Currently, ocean carriers
subsidize similar intermodal
facilities in Portland by
effectively paying for empty
containers to be moved to
those sites, according to the
Tioga Group.
“It appears ocean carri-
ers have been reluctant to
extend that subsidy south of
Portland,” said Smith, the
company’s principal.
Before the commission
decided to delay its decision,
supporters of all three pro-
posals touted the feasibility
of their projects.
“It’s our chance to hit
a home run and we’re try-
ing to hit a grand slam, not
just a home run,” said Larry
Wilson, a Malheur County
commissioner who supports
the Treasure Valley project.
Kevin Mannix, a main
proponent of the Brooks
intermodal facility, said the
site would be best positioned
to take trucks off the road
that are currently serving an
existing base of agricultural
exporters.
“We are trying to take
that shipping business and
put it on rail,” he said.
Key information about
the viability of the business
plan for the Millersburg
facility is proprietary, while
some aspects would firm
up as the project is closer
to being operational, said
Roger Nyquist, chairman of
the Linn County Board of
Commissioners.
HB 2001 takes critical step forward
By MARK MILLER
Oregon Capital Bureau
SALEM — Single-fam-
ily homes have long domi-
nated the housing market in
Oregon.
But could a legislative
proposal from one of Ore-
gon’s most powerful law-
makers, which took a criti-
cal step forward Thursday,
change that?
House Speaker Tina
Kotek, D-Portland, presided
over the passage of one of
her top priorities this year,
House Bill 2001. The bill
would effectively end sin-
gle-family home zoning in
more than 50 Oregon cities.
It passed 43-16 with biparti-
san backing, and now goes
to the Senate.
If HB 2001 becomes law,
by July 2021, cities with
more than 10,000 residents
will have to allow a duplex
on any lot now limited to
a single-family house. By
July 2022, cities with more
than 25,000 residents, as
well as cities and coun-
ties in the Portland metro
area, will have to allow tri-
plexes, quadplexes, town-
houses and cottage clusters
in single-family residential
neighborhoods.
Kotek’s goal is to fos-
ter what she calls “missing
middle” housing, priced for
working- and middle-class
households.
“It’s going to be import-
ant to have more housing
choice and more housing
options in all of our commu-
nity, and limiting new con-
struction in residential areas
to only single-family homes
is not going to help us pre-
pare for the future and pro-
vide more housing,” Kotek
said Monday, June 10.
As of the last census,
nearly two-thirds of Ore-
gon’s homes were sin-
gle-family houses, and ris-
ing real estate prices have
many housing advocates
worried about Oregonians
being “priced out” of buy-
ing a home. Townhouses
and condominiums are typi-
cally less expensive alterna-
tives to standalone houses.
The bill doesn’t out-
law single-family homes or
require existing homes to be
torn down or converted into
duplexes.
So far, Kotek’s plan has
survived criticism from
local governments that see
it as infringing on their right
to plan their own communi-
ties. The League of Oregon
Cities has been lobbying
against it.
“We feel like there’s been
a lot of work to address the
issues of local government,”
Kotek said.
Cities can apply for an
extension under the bill,
giving them more time to
change their land use rules,
if needed.
Several
Democrats
split with Kotek and voted
against HB 2001, includ-
ing Reps. Paul Holvey
and Nancy Nathanson of
Eugene, whose city officials
have been particularly criti-
cal of the bill.
“I would really like to see
this proposal be more geared
toward the arterial streets or
closer to bus routes, those
sorts of applications, than
across all lots throughout
a neighborhood,” Holvey
said at a committee meeting
Tuesday, June 18.
Another Eugene Demo-
crat, Rep. Julie Fahey, spoke
in favor of HB 2001 on
Thursday.
“I represent the neigh-
borhoods in Eugene that are
most impacted by the hous-
ing crisis,” Fahey said, add-
ing, “We need more housing,
and more affordable housing
options, in our community.”
NATIONAL EXTREMES
Yesterday’s National Extremes: (for the 48 contiguous states)
High 105° in Midland, Texas Low 19° in Daniel, Wyo.
NATIONAL WEATHER TODAY
BRIEFLY
House moves to scrap state’s
nonunanimous jury system
Man gets more than 6 years
prison for drug explosion
SALEM (AP) — The Oregon House has
approved a measure that would ask voters to
overturn the state’s decades-long practice of
allowing split juries to convict felony defen-
dants, an anomaly within the American
criminal justice system that reform advo-
cates have targeted as racist. The Oregonian/
OregonLive reports House Joint Resolution
10 passed the chamber 56-0 on Thursday.
The resolution, which proposes chang-
ing Oregon’s Constitution to require juries
to reach unanimous verdicts in all criminal
cases, now goes to the state Senate. Should
it pass there, Gov. Kate Brown’s likely sig-
nature would then send the referendum to
voters in 2020.
PORTLAND (AP) — An Oregon man
who was burned in an explosion caused
by combustible materials used to illegally
make marijuana oil has been sentenced to
more than six years in prison.
The Oregon U.S. Attorney’s Office says
Eric Scully of Cottage Grove was sentenced
Thursday after previously pleading guilty
to endangering human life and illegally
possessing and manufacturing marijuana.
He was also ordered to forfeit personal
property used in his crimes, which includes
a truck, trailer, and over $25,000 in cash.
Scully was treated for serious burns after
a butane honey oil explosion at a storage
facility in Cottage Grove in November 2017.
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