Polk County News
Polk County Itemizer-Observer • May 4, 2016 5A
Miles to go on riverfront property, now Independence Landing
By Emily Mentzer
The Itemizer-Observer
INDEPENDENCE — The
old Valley Concrete site
along the Willamette River
has been cleaned up and
readied for development.
Now the 20-acre parcel
has been renamed Inde-
pendence Landing, City
Manager David Clyne said.
“The development team
was wanting to name it that,
and, without having the
conversation with the city
council, the city council
wanted to name it that,”
Clyne said. “Neither one had
talked to each other, so it’s
really interesting they came
up with the same thing.”
The site, purchased by the
city for $800,000 in October
2014, will be developed by
Tokola Properties Inc. Plans
include residential, retail
and lodging.
The city has spent about
half a million dollars on the
property to increase its ap-
peal to developers, and will
end up spending more be-
fore it’s done, Clyne said.
“It’s our job to build the
infrastructure,” he said, re-
ferring to streets, sewer and
water, for example. “We’re
going to have to invest in
that. We’ve done a lot of eco-
nomic work and market
analysis.”
The city has approached
the public-private partner-
ship with Tokola with as
much of a business attitude
as possible, Clyne said.
It’s not the first time the
city of Independence has
worked with private devel-
opers, and city leaders have
learned a lot from past expe-
riences, Clyne said.
A recent successful exam-
ple of public-private partner-
ship is Riverplace Apartments
on Deann Drive, he said.
“We invested about a mil-
lion bucks on that site,”
Clyne said. “Since that was
done, we’ve either gotten $3
million in cash, or improve-
ments for the property.”
Those improvements in-
clude completion of the In-
dependence Sports Fields
and a paved road going to
the Independence Boat
Landing, he said.
Another successful busi-
ness venture was the loca-
tion of Independence Cine-
ma, Clyne said.
The most obvious example
of a public-private partner-
ship gone wrong is Inde-
pendence Station, Clyne said.
“We are doing a lot more
up front,” he said. “We’re
learning lessons, where we
gave up control and leverage
and security, and the out-
come. So this time around,
the stakes are higher. It’s a
far more sophisticated proj-
ect (at Independence Land-
ing). It’s huge by anybody’s
standards.”
To avoid a disaster, Clyne
said one thing the city has
done is write up more de-
tailed agreements.
“We’re maintaining more
control over early stages
than we did with Independ-
ence Station,” he said.
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