The road looks long

This is a hard one to write. After success at the state Land Use Board of Appeals the first time around, Beaumont-Wilshire Neighbors for Responsible Growth lost the next one. Depleted of energy and resources, we activist neighbors closed our case even as we continue to demand that the building meet code. The city's inability to bring the project into compliance gives pause, as does the ruling itself, which affirmed the city's decision to grant the permit for the contested 50-unit building on Northeast Fremont between 44th and 45th avenues. 

Having read the decision several times—and I've made a living reading legal documents—I confess I still don't understand it, but welcome insight from those who might. One supporter said the board seemed swayed by the power of an already-built building (something that also benefited Dennis Sackhoff—a relative of Wally Remmers's—down in the Richmond neighborhood). No wonder Remmers, like Sackhoff, built headlong in the face of a LUBA legal challenge, throwing as many delays into neighbors' path as he could. It worked.

At the end of the day, I wouldn't recommend the LUBA process to anyone. Save those thousands of dollars for moving expenses, hosting séances to connect with the lost heart and soul of ex-activist now-Commissioner Amanda Fritz, and supporting candidates who prioritize Portlanders' interests over those of out-of-town developers whose projects exact an inordinate toll on places and people. 

Blight or benefit to the neighborhood? The writing's on the wall for Remmers's project in Beaumont-Wilshire.

Here on the eve of Fremont Fest, business owners are gussying up their storefronts for the biggest neighborhood event of the year. Remmers's project, too, is putting its best face forward and showing itself to be the eyesore that neighbors feared it would become. Just a few months after opening its doors, perhaps the building's only fans are taggers—plenty of taupe canvas for everyone and absentee owners/managers make it easy to leave a mark.

Questions outnumber the answers.

Meanwhile, the city has presented its antidote to the spate of demolitions and low-quality development spreading citywide. Amid the speechifying (two hours) and softball questions (15 minutes) at a June forum at Concordia University, city staffer Jill Grenda talked at length about the city's response to the demo epidemic: an elaborate, design-heavy door-hanger that builders would use to notify affected neighbors of home demolitions. Sounds like common sense, except for the part about how it's completely voluntary. Seriously, taxpayers ought to get a refund for the staff time spent on the project.

But that's not all of the city's effort. Grenda also noted that the Bureau of Development Services planned to put a phone number on its website to address concerns regarding asbestos and disposal of other contaminants released in the demolition process. If the city's inaction and lack of meaningful change offends you, you're not alone and feel free to complain loudly to elected leaders. I wouldn't call Grenda, though; last time I wondered aloud to her about why Beaumont-Wilshire's project wouldn't be brought into compliance, she laughed and hung up on me. Portland is the city that works—for Wally Remmers. One wonders how many millions a guy needs when he's already having a hard time finding legit ways to spend them.

(Speaking of "demolition," at a meeting of the Development Review Advisory Committee—which is overwhelmingly made up of builders and their representatives, from consultants to attorneys—a city staffer finally acknowledged that Portland's definition of "remodel" doesn't pass the "straight-face" test. When such a remodel leaves nothing standing, you could argue that you're using the same dirt, right?)

Senior planner Jill Grenda (middle) presented the city's response to the public outcry at the spate of demolitions—look out for that phone number on the BDS website.

Never mind the loss of neighborhood character and heritage and unique, affordable housing, the Bureau of Planning & Sustainability would rather Portlanders focus on entering their new contest! Nominate your favorite view or gazing spot! Win prizes! (OK, kidding about the last part.) With that in mind I took a look around my ever-changing neighborhood and this is what I saw:

A newly built urban dacha dwarves its neighbors.

Oops.

On Fremont, Wally Remmers makes his presence known.

Judging from the response of city staff and leaders to the report from the Portland Historic Landmarks Commission and plenty of neighborhood testimony at City Hall yesterday regarding the record-setting number of home demolitions, soon there may not be much of old Portland left to love. While city staff in the balcony lampooned preservation-minded activists for being too into history and guffawed at every utterance of "equity," it appeared all the words spoken in defense of protecting existing, "first-growth" architecture were falling on deaf ears.

Amid the demo-related testimony, I couldn't help but note the several impassioned neighbors recounting their first taste of another Remmers project running roughshod on Northeast 22nd Avenue. With their widening reputation, the Remmers fellas now are sending out agents to do the dirty work of buying properties under other names. For the record, folks, Jodi Jennings and J2 (J-2?) Investments are not neighbors' friend. 

This is it

Beaumont Village Apartments: Built too big to comply?

Tomorrow we head to Salem for our second hearing in front of the state Land Use Board of Appeals. 

After our success winning a remand there in December, we're going back because the city and developer Wally Remmers were unable or at least unwilling to satisfy that ruling. It feels funny to go argue in front of the officers of that august board whether they meant what they said, but that's where we are. And it's worth it if we have a chance at reducing the size and impacts of the Beaumont Village Apartments project on Northeast Fremont between 44th and 45th avenues. We also aim to bring the building into conformance with code; neighbors—and any other users of Fremont for that matter—should not have to bear a burden in excess of what the law allows.

As the Buddha said, There are only two mistakes one can make on the road to truth: not going all the way, and not starting.

Developer aims to turn problems into payday

So much for making long-term investments in the neighborhoods: Developer Wally Remmers took some choice sites in Portland neighborhoods and squandered their potential with "greedy buildings." Speaking of the g word, he's asking just $13.6 million for the Beaumont Village building (and an additional $13.5 million for the other two properties), but neighbors likely will live with these projects and their outsize impacts forever.

The paint's barely dry on Wally Remmers's much-contested and non-code conforming 50-unit building on Northeast Fremont between 44th and 45th avenues (shown above, at left), and he's already putting it up for sale along with two other recently built projects that have rankled neighbors. It's not the first time he's ducked out early on a development, leaving expensive difficulties in his wake. Let's hope any buyers do their due diligence.

A case of "greenmail" stuck it to Eastmoreland

Developer to neighbors: Drop the LUBA appeal,
or kiss those huge evergreens goodbye.

With Beaverton developer Wally Remmers chasing projects headlong throughout Portland—how long can all the foul balls stay up in the air?—he finally might have hit a wall in Eastmoreland, where a large-scale building proposal for 3058 S.E. Woodstock Blvd. is encountering the usual neighbor resistance, only this time it's in the blue-chip part of town. 

Watch some of the drama go down Thursday, April 10, at City Hall, 1221 S.W. Fourth Ave. [UPDATE: As of Wednesday afternoon, April 9, the hearing was postponed because neighbors had reached a proposed settlement with Remmers; as last reported on the Eastmoreland Neighborhood Association website, neighbors were offering up to $150,000 for Remmers to leave the Southeast Woodstock Boulevard property alone—presumably on top of the original purchase price?] 

This could be the start of a nice new business strategy for Remmers & Co.: Buy low, threaten big, and cash in high. If only Beaumont-Wilshire had similarly deep pockets; neighbors here have struggled for almost two years to defend ourselves from a Remmers project that shouldn't have been permitted as designed.

Regardless of the details of Eastmoreland's wide-ranging dispute, it did have some echoes of Remmers's building in Beaumont-Wilshire, namely preferential treatment for a developer, hazy code history, and radically different visions clashing over the future of a neighborhood. 

One wonders if the city of Portland has succeeded in chasing most of the quality developers away. How much longer can the city and its taxpayers afford to spend so much energy and resources on a guy who's gathering up the choice sites around town, then squandering them with "greedy," even noncompliant, buildings? We can do better, and do business with those who also care about Portland's neighborhoods. To quote the news ticker off the Eastmoreland Neighborhood Association website: 

"The neighbors working with Vic Remmers on the 'greenmail' issue have worked hard, but Remmers continues to want almost $200k to leave the Moreland Lane [the site that's subject of Thursday's City Hall hearing] property alone. The discussions have generally been courteous except for one somewhat ominous email that includes ... 'In regards to your current LUBA appeal, if you prevail and we end up having to tear up Moreland lane to add the sidewalk, we will have to tear down those 3 huge evergreen tree’s that are currently are being saved. I understand that you are trying to give us a hard time and make this difficult for us, but I really think you will be unhappy with the results if you were to prevail with that appeal. Those tree’s are magnificent and provide shade for your basketball court and your backyards.'"

Build it, and they will notice

Congrats to Wally Remmers for the mention in the current issue of Portland Monthly, which focuses on the city's neighborhoods. Remmers's Northeast Fremont project is called out as "a bloated 50-unit box" and a classic example of a "greedy building."

Designer-developer Kevin Cavenaugh, who works hard to put up interesting architecture that's an asset instead of a burden to the neighborhoods where he works, coined the term. In the story he elaborates: 

“Everybody knows a greedy building when they see it. The design follows a formula, no matter what neighborhood it’s for. They’re lazy. As a developer, everything you do to make a building better makes the numbers worse. So if you start from maximizing profits, you don’t give yourself an opportunity to do great or even good buildings."

The only thing to add in Beaumont-Wilshire's case is that the Northeast Fremont building's not just greedy, it still doesn't comply with code and shouldn't be occupied until it does.

A little googling turns up the irony

All's ducky down on Wally Remmers's farm, where you could park 31 of these things.

Fools' Day aside, here's something actually funny. About this same time last year that activists from all over Portland were packing City Hall and meeting rooms to argue for rules that require some parking in large apartment buildings—and while developer Wally Remmers was telling us it was a different world and no one owned cars anymore—he was simultaneously singing the opposite tune at his property on Sauvie Island.

A year ago Multnomah County was entertaining Remmers's (thru his attorney Michael Robinson) pleas to allow him to build a beauty of a parking lot—31 spaces, all paved—at his island acreage. For a "farm worker break room." Sweet! All of the Remmers/Sackhoff apartment dwellers and their neighbors tired of looking for parking around their homes, here it is! We just need a shuttle bus.

County staff questioned why such a fine parking facility was necessary for a farm, especially because no one was supposed to actually live on-site or, gosh forbid, hunt ducks thereabouts. That won't happen because Remmers signed a voluntary compliance agreement saying so, which is hilarious because we see from the record how well he does with mandatory compliance (for that, keep reading, and enjoy the fact that he sometimes forgets to obtain permits, say, for a sizable addition to the aforementioned break room).

Build first, protest later. Sound familiar? If all this doesn't quack you up (sorry), you should see the response Remmers and the city recently submitted to neighbors' second petition to the state Land Use Board of Appeals. In it, the developer and city describe the state body's first ruling in neighbors' favor as a mere "suggestion" for fixing the poorly designed project. So that's why they ignored it.

It should come as no surprise

Now collectible! I assume they will correct the date along with the name change.

Another sign of yore

This was in my pile of vacation e-mail or I would have posted it earlier—

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Fremont Corridor signage dedication scheduled

Forming a unique public-private partnership, the city of Portland and developer Wally Remmers have decided to enact a name change for the commercial corridor in a Northeast neighborhood. By summer all of the Beaumont Village signs along Northeast Fremont will be removed, then reinstalled with ones reading "Remmers Village."

"We think this is a change whose time has come," Phil Sharlow of Bureau of Development Services said. "It's all we could do to show how much we appreciate him as a customer." City planner Bill Benda, who along with other city staff works closely with the developer and his architecture and legal teams, said: "We've bent over forward and backward for Wally Remmers, and want to see more of his projects that stamp out neighborhood character. Beaumont-Wilshire can serve as a showcase for our vision of Portland's future."

The release finishes with details of the unveiling of the first Remmers Village street sign, appropriately sited at his signature project on Northeast Fremont between 44th and 45th avenues, at 6 pm today, yes April 1.