Comments on: Neighbors want Central Catholic to scrap expansion and scram

By: Charlie

Charlie — Fri, 27 May 2011 01:08:09 +0000

The school by there own admission has more that 225 cars coming daily into the neighborhood. They are destroying 13 spaces on their campus leaving 4 spaces and want to build 15 in the residential vacant lots for a net gain of 2 spaces, hardly worth the loss of sorely needed housing stock in our neighborhood not to mention the degradation of our property values. I’m sorry but taking an additional 2 cars off the street just doesn’t cut it, it really isn’t helping address the complaint, 2 cars, really. Ben has it right though, it is totally a zoning issue, the lots they own are zoned R-5 residential.

By: Bob O'Halloran

Bob O'Halloran — Tue, 24 May 2011 18:06:13 +0000

Neighbors complain because students park on adjacent streets, yet at the same time argue the school should not create off-street parking, on currently bare lots the school owns, that would help address the complaint? Seems inconsistent.

By: Ben

Ben — Sat, 21 May 2011 06:26:52 +0000

Eddie, glad you asked! Here are just a few ideas that have been proposed to the school by the INCH folks:

– Build a parking lot on-site under the sports field
– Build a parking lot on-site on top of the sports field
– Park & ride from near-by parking lots with shuttle service to the school
– Provide subsidized trimet passes to students (although this doesn’t fix the after-hours events problem)
– Voluntarily limit expansion of enrollment AND extracurricular events
– Enforce the existing parking agreements
– Exit-only access to the gym doors to encourage parking along wider arterial roads
– Community outreach on behalf of the students to encourage cohesion of the school and surrounding residents
– Create a one-way grid around the school to reduce vehicular congestion
– Establish on-site loading and unloading zones to eliminate illegally parked vans and buses in road-ways

The list goes on…

I’m going to once again bring up that this is a zoning issue having to do with the livability and character of the surrounding blocks. Yes, the school owns the land, but I also own my property. Could I bull-doze my house and put in a Seven-Eleven? No, because it’s a residential lot and to do so would not fit with the nature and use of the surrounding area. I suppose I could apply for a conditional use permit (as the school has done) but I would certainly expect some push-back (as the school is now receiving).

By: Eddie

Eddie — Sat, 21 May 2011 05:26:08 +0000

Seems like the school owns a lot and wants to put parking on it… but the neighborhood says “No, that’s a park, you can’t park there!”… Of course, it’s not really a park, it’s school property. They’ve been using it as a park, but they own it, they should be able to turn it into parking if they want to.

So, the change in city transit, combined with the school’s need for class space has caused too much student parking. Now they want to expand buildings again, and the complaint is that it will worsen the parking. They have a solution for that, but because folks in the neighborhood have played on school property, it’s somehow wrong for them to use it to solve the problem.

What exactly, does the neighborhood suggest? They state the “get out” petition was just to draw attention to the problem… so what is the solution?

By: Ben

Ben — Sat, 21 May 2011 01:34:01 +0000

Of the comments defending the expansion, I’m still waiting to read one that justifies paving over residential lots that are _outside_ the current school site, and changing existing zoning rules to solve a problem that CC created in the first place. I think it helps to put this whole situation into perspective when you read Charlie’s comment regarding the history of the school. Central Catholic has worked their way into this situation over the years by building on top of all the on-site parking and now wants to just push the problem out into the neighborhood by paving residential lots. Even without knowing the history though, I don’t see how it’s unreasonable for neighbors to object to the expansion plan.

Also, for what it’s worth I voted in favor of the bond measure and am a firm believer in the overwhelming value of education. However, just like Sandy said, I also value the livability and character of my neighborhood!

By: Charlie

Charlie — Sat, 21 May 2011 00:40:34 +0000

This is great, really. I love the fact that people are expressing their ideas and feelings about this issue. Of course the petition was put on-line for attention, we don’t think they really would move nor did we expect that to happen. It is simply a measure of how frustrated the neighbors are at CC’s lack of respect for a neighborhood that predated the school by 60 years. We want to bring attention to this neighborhood. The neighbors have been struggling with the traffic and parking for 25 years. Negotiations have been ongoing thorough several additions and remodels over that span of time but the lack of headway and respect for the neighbors in this process has reached a tipping point. Twenty-five years ago there wasn’t really a problem. When Trimet discontinued bus service on Stark St, when it became unsafe for kids in our society to be on the streets walking or riding bikes, when 16 yr old kids started having cars to drive to school instead of bussing or walking, when the school population went from 500 in the early eighties when I moved in to 788 this year, traffic and parking got really bad, go figure. Every time the school has done an expansion they have removed more on-site parking and put a bigger burden on the neighbors to absorb their parking needs. Yes, the school was here when I moved in but if they hadn’t built a second gym, added 288 students, built over their 40 car parking lot , lied to us about their intentions to expand into the residential houses of the neighborhood with admin. staff we wouldn’t be having these discussions. Most neighbors support the school’s students and teachers. I think they have a fine academic program and wish PPS had as good a track record with their students. Here is the crux of the problem. If this were a new school they would be required to have 7 parking spaces per classroom which would be 224 parking spaces. After this addition they will have 4 on-site spaces, yeah, 4. If CC would provide parking either on-site or a park and ride somewhere, we would be happy to have them become a good neighbor. Every neighborhood has a resident that causes problems for the rest, Central Catholic is ours.

By: Demetri

Demetri — Fri, 20 May 2011 20:50:48 +0000

I’m sure this has “absolutely nothing” to do with anti-Christian or anti-Catholic bigotry. 😉

By: Sandy

Sandy — Fri, 20 May 2011 19:46:01 +0000

Yes the school has been here a long time, and many of the houses have been here longer than the school, the neighborhood was here when the school moved in, and everything has changed over time. The question is, do we value the neighborhood, is Central Catholic concerned about the neighborhood, does it feel like it is one part of a larger community?

Beyond the negative impact of traffic and parking by students/parents are the, in many ways far more onerous, impacts from afternoon and weekend activities.

Encroachment into the residential block by the school to make a parking lot on what has been a green space for the last 25 years because the school tore down one house and moved the other seems to me to be an aggressive disregard for the community of residents. That, taken in combination with the plan to double the height of the school in certain places and erase the buffer between the side walk and the building and to turn three more houses into administration buildings does not I think reflect concern for this largely residential neighborhood.

I also think it must be said that after many years of neighbors working in good faith with the school to find lasting solutions, we have finally lost all faith and trust. The negotiations have not been honest, information has been withheld and obfuscated, past signed agreements have not been complied with. At the end of the day, many neighbors have put an enormous amount of time and energy trying to understand all the technical legal documents and find creative solutions, we have been met not with dialogue and a spirit of collaboration but instead reasons why our suggestions do not fit with their plans. Basically all the time we took out of our lives to work with the school and the architects feels now like it was not in aid of finding solutions, but rather spent in aid of the school being able to say they jumped though the hoop of public engagement with us.

One last thing, I actually like the school, I like having a school in the neighborhood. I don’t think being generally supportive of the school precludes my opposition to their plans, after all I like my home and my community too.

By: concerned neighbor

concerned neighbor — Fri, 20 May 2011 18:57:50 +0000

There are a lot of misinformed comments here. The neighbors HAVE worked with the school over many years, the school has not held up some aspects of the agreement, and now it wants to expand.

The argument that the school was here first so the neighbors have no right to complain is kinda lame. This was a residential neighborhood before there was a school. But really, let’s just deal with the reality of the PRESENT. The school needs to accept the size of its lot, accept the reality that there are families living around it, and scale its enrollment accordingly. No one is trying to limit their right to update its classrooms, etc. (And I’m sure most people around here voted YES for Portland Public Schools recently.)

It’s sad to see neighbors writing sarcastic comments about the petition but at the same time harboring complaints about the school. If they knew how much work some of their neighbors have put in negotiating with the school in good faith over the last 25 years, they would be grateful. The current expansion plan could seriously impact the streets around the school, especially 26th, and we’ve tried to make sure everyone is aware of the facts. Regardless of how you feel about the petition, you can still testify at the hearing on June 6 if you are concerned about the future of your neighborhood.

By: PDXMB

PDXMB — Fri, 20 May 2011 18:08:58 +0000

Central Catholic is no more a “commuter high school” than Grant. My son will be attending next year, and “commuting” on his bike from Laurelhurst. Of his classmates at All Saints – a neighborhood school – 75% will be attending Central next year, in addition to many other students and friends from Laurelhurst Elementary, Irvington, Alameda, Sunnyside, Buckman, Madeleine, etc.

The neighbors’ complaints really ring hollow when you consider the fact that the school predates any and all of them. Can the school do better to work with the neighbors? I hope so. But really, there is only one party that needs to think about relocating, and it’s not the school. The call for relocation is nothing more than an attention-grabbing maneuver – and hey, look – it worked!