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About Hermiston herald. (Hermiston, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 30, 2020)
NEWS A8 • HERMISTONHERALD.COM WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2020 Giant produce arrives for Funland Staff photos by Ben Lonergan At left, workers unload giant produce at Hermiston’s maintenance facility on Monday, Sept. 28, 2020. The larger-than-life replicas will be part of the new Funland playground when it is completed. Above, a worker guides a replica of a mythical squid-like creature known as a kraken off of a truck. The piece will be used in the adventure area of the new Funland playground. City council advances industrial park project A local improvement district will amass funds for paving and utilities By JADE MCDOWELL NEWS EDITOR The Hermiston City Council approved formation of a local improvement dis- trict during their Monday, Sept. 28, meeting to make more industrial land on the south side of town “shovel ready” for development. The LID will assess prop- erties along Campbell Drive and Penney Avenue for fund- ing to pave the remainder of Campbell Drive and install water and sewer mains in the area. It will also create a road connecting East Penney Ave- nue to Highway 395 across from Bellingers, and create an access road into 40 acres of industrial land owned by the Port of Umatilla. Half of the project will be paid for by a $1.46 million federal grant from the Eco- nomic Development Admin- istration, which Hermiston qualifi ed for after Hermiston Foods closed its processing plant in that industrial zone. The required 50% match for the grant will be met by $250,000 from the city of Hermiston, $50,000 from Umatilla County and money assessed from neighboring property owners. The Port of Umatilla, which owns a majority of the land in the new LID, will be assessed $700,000 while the other 18 parcels will split the remaining $500,000 in costs based on the amount of frontage they have along the project. Two of those property owners, Jon Patterson and Craig Evans, told the city council that the price tag estimated by city engineers at Anderson Perry seemed high. 0 “I could do it myself for less,” Patterson said. Evans said he would be assessed for more than he originally paid for his lot. Property owners can block the formation of an LID if more than 60% of the affected owners fi le an offi - cial opposition, known as a remonstrance. Assistant City Manager Mark Morgan said four of the 20 affected properties fi led remon- strances, for 20%, but two of the remonstrances were determined invalid because the owners had previously signed legal agreements with the city to never oppose an LID there. Morgan said the city hopes to start utility con- struction next spring and be paving by September 2021. He said much of Hermis- ton’s easily accessible indus- trial properties have fi lled up or are too far away from water and sewer to be fi nan- cially viable for develop- ment. This project will open up new parcels of varying sizes for development. On Sept. 28, the council also approved a supplemen- tal budget adding more than $10 million to the 2020-21 budget. About $9.6 million of that comes from the sale of bonds that will pay for construction of a new city hall and renovation of the basement of the Hermiston Library. Another $540,000 comes from federal CARES Act stimulus dollars that were awarded to the city, and $159,890 is the insur- ance payout for the damage to the old city hall caused by a fi re in the HVAC system in December 2019. City Canager Byron Smith showed councilors designs for the new city hall during the meeting, which he hopes to put out to bid in October so that construc- tion can begin in late 2020 or early 2021. The plan includes a main level, second story and base- ment that will allow the city to centralize services currently spread through- out multiple buildings in Hermiston. That includes the munici- pal court, which is currently taking up space at the pub- lic safety building needed by Hermiston Police Depart- ment to accommodate its growth. While councilors all approved of the fl oor plan, they did not like some cos- metic aspects of the exte- rior renderings, including barn wood around the win- dows. They were split evenly between three other alterna- tives for exterior materials that Smith showed them, and he said it seemed fair to let city staff who will be work- ing in the building break the tie. During the portion at the end of the meeting for city councilor comment, coun- cilor Roy Barron said he was feeling “disappointed” about the outcome of the council’s last meeting, which resulted in a vote to adopt an ordinance regulat- ing homeless shelters in the city. One aspect of the ordi- nance bans shelters from within 1,000 feet of schools or parks, and the Stepping Stones nonprofi t which had hoped to build a shelter in Hermiston stated after- ward that the rule did not leave them a viable location inside the city. Barron asked if the plan- ning department could draw up some new maps of what options might be available if that number were changed to 500 feet or 750 feet, so the council could revisit the issue and decide if they wanted to amend the ordi- nance. City Planner Clint Spencer said he would do so. % 60 F O R APR MONTHS with $16.67 per $1,000 borrowed 2020 PRIUS 2020 CAMRY 2020 COROLLA 2020 RAV4 TOYOTA.COM See Your Local Toyota Dealer Prototypes shown with options. Offer excludes Corolla Hybrid and RAV4 Hybrid models. APR on approved credit from Toyota Financial Services (TFS). Call 1-800-79-Toyota for details. Does not include taxes, license, title/registration fees, dealer fees and Oregon tax (.05%). Down payment may be required. Does not include College Grad or Military Rebate. Varies by region. See dealer for details. *Covers normal factory scheduled service for 2 years or 25K miles, whichever occurs first. See participating dealer for coverage details. Offers end 9/30/20. * A WORC taxi will get you to and from your job anywhere in western Umatilla County. Anyone who comes in through the end of December, can get four FREE punch cards, which equals 40 one-way rides to/from work. Visit https://hermiston.or.us/public-transit to find out how to sign up, and how WORC and the HART bus service work together to connect Hermiston.
