Beaverton was awarded a $1 million grant to accelerate its plans for sustainable development through the , the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced yesterday.

The city will use the funds to work through its 20-year Civic Plan and move forward on urban renewal projects, focusing on the 24-acre section of Beaverton‘s downtown known as the Creekside District.

The Civic Plan, which went through 18 months of drafts and public comment before City Council approved it in April 2011, includes initiatives such as the creation of an affordable housing development strategy, the expansion of the Beaverton Central Plant, and other projects that will help establish a downtown core and connect housing to public transportation.

“Now we’ll be able to get serious,” said Beaverton Mayor Denny Doyle, adding that five city staffers will work through various development plans and associated coding issues. “We are anxious to deliver the projects we outlined for urban renewal, and this (grant) will help us plan and do it right.”

HUD received applications for more than $500 million through its Sustainable Communities Challenge and issued approximately $96 million to communities throughout the country.

Beaverton will manage the grant in partnership with Portland State University and Clean Water Services and with support from the State of Oregon Regional Solutions Center, Friends of Beaverton Creek and the Central Beaverton Neighborhood Association.

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The city of Beaverton announced today its plans to develop two mixed-use buildings on city-owned space in partnership with a private development team.

One of the buildings, developed by , will have 48 units of affordable housing with 1,700 square feet of open-to-the-public community space. will develop a separate building with 55 units of workforce/market-rate housing with 7,200 square feet of ground-floor commercial space.

“Roy Kim and Central Bethany Development have a very successful track record in developing this type of project in a suburban setting,” said Beaverton Mayor Denny Doyle in a statement today. “Their development of the Bethany area is one of the best in all of Washington County—I know that Mr. Kim will deliver an outstanding development in Central Beaverton.”

Both buildings will sit on a block at the corner of Southwest First Street and Lombard Avenue, a property the city purchased in June for $1.07 million. Beaverton issued a request for proposals for developers in July, and Community Partners for Affordable Housing was one of two firms that submitted applications.

Beaverton Community Development Director Don Mazziotti said the details of the public-private partnership will be laid out in a disposition and development agreement to be negotiated soon. The city’s contribution might include a long-term lease of the property, he said.

The existing buildings on the site are currently being deconstructed.

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Gas stations may not be known for sustainability, but that could change in the near future if two businesses in Oregon continue to pump up their efforts.

Bob and Katy Barman, who recently opened what is being billed as the nation’s first green Chevron station, have never met the founders of . But they’re all linked by a common cause – taking the lead in setting what could become the standard for sustainability in gas stations.

The Barmans’ station at the corner of Allen and Murray boulevards in Beaverton features an eco-roof, a geothermal system, a solar array, and a free electric-vehicle charging station. The owners bill the new station as the first of its kind for a major oil company franchise, and the green systems may point to a shift in the industry standard.

A capital investment of approximately $2 million was supplied by the Barmans, who hope their effort will encourage other owners of gas stations and properties to limit their environmental impacts.

Bob Barman, who previously worked as a sales representative for Union Oil Co. of California and whose father worked for Texaco, said he was inspired by his 10-year tenure on the board of the Lake Oswego Corp. The organization manages lakefront property on Oswego Lake, and it was during those meetings that Barman for the first time learned about the environmental dangers associated with impervious pavement and storm-water runoff.

“Once I learned about it, I had to do something – that’s just in my DNA. And it’s not just the oil industry that’s a step behind,” said Barman, who owns three gas stations in Oregon. “Why aren’t chains of grocery stores putting grass roofs on every building?”

Meanwhile, Oregon’s leading biofuel company is already several steps ahead when it comes to fuel station innovations. It’s planning to continue pushing existing practices at its second station in Eugene.

As a collector, a producer and a retailer, Salem-based SeQuential has been able to push the envelope on every level of the supply chain. The company in September 2006 opened the country’s first all-biofuel and biofuel-blend fueling station in Eugene. In addition to featuring a solar canopy, a living roof and bio-swales, it pumps fuel derived almost entirely from used cooking oil and ethanol waste streams.

CEO and founder Ian Hill would welcome more competition.

“From a large perspective, we would love to see the whole industry shift,” he said. “We’re not threatened, but are really excited to see baby steps happen and hope it’s a precursor for more of the industry to move toward sustainable offerings and sustainable design.”

SeQuential has worked with the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality to incorporate gray-water recycling into its on-site irrigation system. The plan to reuse the station’s sink water is on the edge of being permitted, according to Hill. The DEQ recently passed a program dealing with use of gray water.

The new fueling station is not under construction yet, but Hill hopes it will open in the first quarter of 2012.

“Whenever you’re trying to do something different, there’s an education curve for everybody,” he said. “We’re trying to do something different, and that will always take a bit of work.”

Barman also faced challenges in pushing for features that were new to the city of Beaverton. Planning the “green” rebuild took almost two years in part because the city’s building code did not have rules for the living roof.

“We looked at the code, and our staff worked with Bob to make this possible,” Beaverton Mayor Denny Doyle said. “It’s just a fascinating business decision he and his wife made, and when we have a citizen who wants to do something and is willing to spend a lot of money to make it happen, we are glad when we’re able to help.”

But the Chevron station won’t include the highest available blends of biodiesel. When Barman looked into the possibility, he said, industry professionals cautioned that the market wasn’t ready for a blend higher than 10 percent biodiesel.

“We’re offering one pump with B10, and we have the piping and ability to take up to B99. We can switch it over tonight, and we’ll ratchet up the percentage as the market allows,” Barman said.

Barman expects to accumulate $2,000 in monthly energy savings, and intercept 43,000 gallons of rainwater annually. He hopes it will send a message to other corporate managers who may otherwise remain unaware of their opportunities.

“If you went into many corporate board rooms of many companies, they wouldn’t know of these procedures or practices,” he said. “I didn’t.”

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After spending $525,000 over 20 months to develop a 20-year plan – the – for achieving community vision, city officials are taking another big step.

Beaverton City Council last week authorized the purchase of three parcels – to become one city block – at the southwest corner of First Street and Lombard Avenue. City officials hope the property, which is being earmarked for redevelopment into workforce housing, can help spur private development.

“This purchase is the first in what I hope to be several strategic property acquisitions to help facilitate redevelopment and to begin bringing the recently adopted Civic Plan to life for (Beaverton),” Mayor Denny Doyle said. “Property acquisition is a key priority.”

The city will pay $1.07 million for the parcels in a deal expected to close June 10. Doyle, who took office in 2009, said the city has set aside small amounts of general fund money so that it can jump on opportunities like this one.

The Civic Plan, an update of Beaverton’s 1981 planning effort, outlines the vision that citizens and government officials have for the city. One of the key goals is to make the central city, which includes Old Town, into a business and residential district.

Community Development Director Don Mazziotti envisions the lot, which houses three part-time businesses that will relocate, being transformed into a four-story building with housing for workers making approximately $66,900 – the city’s median annual income. The upper three floors would consist of 70-80 two- or three-bedroom units, while the bottom floor would be neighborhood retail, he said.

“We’re guessing that this site is ideal for housing, and that’s my personal intuition, but we will listen to any developer with a good idea and capital,” Mazziotti said.

Gary Winkler, a principal with multifamily brokerage firm Winkler & DuPont Real Estate Services, said city governments typically don’t buy land to serve as a pass-through to a private developer.

“It’s an aggressive move by Beaverton, but I think Beaverton needs to be aggressive right now,” Winkler said. “I can’t think of any projects that have moved forward out there recently.

“They need to create structure around downtown in Beaverton, and this lets them control what happens with a site they see as a catalyst.”

Paul Roder, chairman of the Central Beaverton Neighborhood Association, said that purchases such as this one are exactly what his organization believes will spur redevelopment downtown and initiate the Civic Plan.

“Maybe this isn’t a keystone of the area and the Civic Plan, but it can serve as an example of what’s to come. It’s an exciting opportunity for that area.”

Mazziotti added that the purchase will bring construction to Beaverton after several years of relatively few projects.

“Growth has been slow over the past few years and we want to make things happen,” he said. “We believe this can serve as a catalyst site.”

The city will combine the three sites into one and issue a request for qualifications. Once city officials have a list of qualified bidders, they will conduct a detailed request for proposals process and select a developer. Mazziotti expects a developer to be selected by September.

City officials don’t expect much public money to go into the project. The site is in the city’s proposed new urban renewal area, but both Doyle and Mazziotti doubt this project will receive any urban renewal money. They both expect work to start on the Old Town project before bonds would be issued for the proposed URA, which won’t go before voters until November.

“We want to get this going quickly,” Doyle said. “We think this is a good time to get something out of the ground that could bring about more development.”

More information about the Civic Plan is available at .

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Beaverton Mayor Denny Doyle will be a member of the National League of Cities’ committee in charge of creating the organization’s energy and environment policies, the NLC announced today.

The 2011 Energy, Environment and Natural Resources Policy and Advocacy Steering Committee will direct NLCs policy positions on energy, clean air, solid and hazardous waste, water quality and supply, natural wetlands and endangered species. The NLC advocates for cities in Washington, D.C.

“(Doyle’s) appointment is not only good for Beaverton but potentially for the entire state of Oregon,” said the mayor’s spokesman Bill LaMarche in an email. “Mayor Doyle’s vision is that Beaverton serves as a model for sustainability for other communities as well. He will continue to be a vocal advocate for the protection of our environment and the wise use of our limited resources,” he said.

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What will Beaverton look like in 20 years? That is what Denny Doyle, the city’s mayor, asked citizens during his address to the city earlier this year. Soon, the answer may be clearer as the city works to develop a comprehensive development plan.

“When I came here last year the first thing I asked was, ‘Where is the plan for the city?’ ” said Don Mazziotti, community development director for the city of Beaverton. “What I found out was the Beaverton Comprehensive Plan hadn’t been updated since 1981.

“The 1981 plan confronted some very basic issues associated with growth because it was a boom period for Beaverton. The plan really helped the city develop into what it is today, but there is no doubt that things have changed and we now need to update and refocus our strategy.”

The team developing the plan will be basing its work with the notion that Beaverton is a ‘first-tier suburb.’ The term was coined by William Hudnut III, an acclaimed author and former four-term mayor of Indianapolis.

“A first-tier suburb is an urban place that grew up immediately next to a city throughout the 1960s and 1970s,” Mazziotti said. “Now these suburbs are starting to experience some of the same pains and successes that the adjacent city had went through in the past.”

City staff are in the process of finishing the first step of the development plan, the gathering phase. E.D. Hovee & Co., a consulting firm based in Vancouver, Wash., is finishing a socioeconomic and demographic study that will be combined with the community visioning plan and several other studies, reports and recommendations, to be amalgamated into the development plan.

Mazziotti said city staff hope to gather over 1,000 bullet points from the Beaverton Community Vision Project and then synthesize them into 100 strong goals. Each goal will then be outlined with a realistic time line, a funding plan and an implementation strategy, he said.

Some of the main areas of focus will include a development strategy for downtown, a housing strategy to upgrade and stabilize neighborhoods, a land-use and transportation plan to alleviate congestion, an economic development strategy and a set of citywide sustainability principles.

Laura Kelly, associate planner in Beaverton’s community development department, said that four areas already are emerging as priorities for citizens: fixing problems related to traffic congestion, creating a vibrant downtown district, determining the city’s focused identity and maintaining the city’s relatively safe nature.

While the Beaverton development plan will definitely address basic issues associated with growth, it also will identify ways to beautify the city and brand it, Kelly said.

The Portland-based Leland Consulting Group was contracted by the Business Development Services Group recently to develop and present a concept plan to highlight three creeks in Beaverton – Beaverton Creek, Wessenger Creek and Hall Creek – and plan development around them. The firm presented a plan to make downtown more approachable by building walking trails and bicycle paths that would follow the creeks and lead to various public spaces and business districts. Elements of that concept plan will definitely be part of the development plan, Mazziotti said.

The final decisions on all elements of the development plan will be made by City Council and the Civic Plan Citizens Advisory Committee. The city has issued a request for proposals from consulting firms to develop the plan. A firm will be selected in the next month, and city staff hope to have the plan approved by City Council and the advisory committee by spring 2011.

In the meantime, City Council is in the process of approving an updated comprehensive development code and a community visioning plan. Both documents are expected to be approved by mid-July.

Hudnut will be presenting the concept of a first-tier suburb to city staff and citizens on June 24 at the Arts & Communication Magnet Academy’s theater in Beaverton. The event will officially kick off the development plan process.

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Don Mazziotti has his eye on undeveloped property in downtown Beaverton, but it’s not for a baseball stadium this time.

After negotiations to build a Triple-A stadium in Beaverton came to halt in October, the city hit upon a new idea to reinvigorate its city core: more housing.

Beaverton city council last week reviewed a draft Memorandum of Understanding with Providence Health and Services to locate a three-to-five story, mixed-use senior living facility called ElderPlace at a city-owned block bounded by First Street, Angel and Main avenues, and Farmington Road.

Mazziotti, hired in September as the city’s new community development director, says if Providence can secure funding, ElderPlace could jump start more housing projects in the central city.

Except for a few smaller townhouse projects and mixed-use condo project The Round, Beaverton has seen little multi-family residential development in its downtown in recent years.

“Beaverton has seen the same pause in real estate and development as everywhere else,” Mazziotti said. “But recent reports on third-quarter performance show that Beaverton has seen an expansion of leased space and rents at traditional levels.”

“This is long overdue,” said Beaverton Mayor Denny Doyle. “Older apartments in downtown have been closed or torn down with nothing to replace them. This project would be in a highly visible spot. We want it to look good and make some financial sense.”

ElderPlace would provide 50 to 60 units of assisted-living housing, with ground-floor health care and social services provided by Providence. The company currently runs five ElderPlace communities in the Portland-metro area, with a total annual revenue of $45 million in 2008.

Statistics from the US Census Bureau’s 2006-08 American Community Survey indicate that 9.6 percent of the population of Beaverton is over 65 years of age.

“There is a need for senior housing in our central city,” said Beaverton City Councilor Cathy Stanton. “We have a substantial senior population and the need was present for such a project before this great recession.”

Providence has applied for funds through the city’s HOME Investment Partnership Program, which provides money to increase affordable housing, according to Gary Walker, director of public affairs for Providence.

The company also has discussed applying for federal funding through low-income tax credits and other programs, Walker said.

“This has to happen fairly quickly given the time period for applying for federal funding,” Doyle said. “We’re trying to get our ducks in a row here so we can help (Providence) find federal money.”

Mazziotti says he estimates the cost of the facility being between $6 million and $7 million.

“I can’t predict the future better than anyone else,” Mazziotti said. “Whether economics will allow this remains to be seen, but if this project goes forward, several adjoining properties owned by public entities would become likely candidates for redevelopment.”

Some of the neighboring properties around the ElderPlace site are owned by the Beaverton School District while others are owned by private parties.

Mazziotti said the city will embark on a technical planning exercise next year to come up with a redevelopment plan for the whole central district. A significant part of that could be more four- and five-story housing structures, he said.

“When I say higher densities, I’m not speaking of 30-story buildings,” Mazziotti said. “But the possibility exists to redevelop these properties into neighborhood scale developments.”

“Given our tight supply of property, any new housing will have to be vertical,” Doyle said. “Some people don’t like that, but we have to grow up rather than out.”

Beaverton City Council will meet Nov. 30th to discuss whether or not to enter into an MOU with Providence for ElderPlace. A development agreement could be struck as early as April 2010.

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Did he or didn’t he? That’s the debate that’s apparently cropped up over a claim by the owners of BG Plaza in Beaverton that Mayor Denny Doyle during a private meeting Friday told them the city is no longer interested in condemning the property to make room for a baseball stadium.

“The Mayor told us he that the city no longer wants to consider condemnation … ,” Domonic Biggi said in a release issued Monday afternoon by his family, which owns the Cedar Hills Boulevard office/retail complex.

But on the heels of the Biggi release came one from the city in which Doyle said the meeting was little more than a “get-acquainted” chat, with “no commitments” made by anyone.”

The problem is that the meeting was private. So Doyle doesn’t feel it’s appropriate, or necessary, to comment further on what was — or wasn’t — said, according to Amy Miner, the city’s public information manager.

For Gino Biggi, Domonic’s father, the debate is moot. No matter what Doyle did or didn’t say, Gino Biggi said he believes the city eventually will try to condemn the Plaza property as part of a plan to create new home for the Portland Beavers when they lose their current base at PGE Park in Portland in 2011.

During a council meeting Monday night, however, Gary Brentano, the city’s business services development director, said the city’s studying four possible places in Beaverton where the stadium could be placed.

Gino Biggi has his own idea about where the city should put the stadium, specifically on a chunk of land behind the Beaverton Transit Center. Biggi and other members of his family own small pieces of land there, which could be combined with land that a trailer park and a residential complex sit on to total about 17 acres, he said.

The one place he won’t willingly stand for the city putting a stadium, however, is in a location that would include BG Plaza. He purchased the property in the 1940s, he said, and for years the property was a losing deal. Now, however, with the Plaza paid off and about 85 percent of space there leased out, Biggi’s finally reaping the benefits of what he says was a lifetime of investment.

“That (property) pays me a hell of a lot of money,” he said, “a hell of a lot. It’s not for sale.”

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Did he or didn’t he? That’s the debate that’s apparently cropped up over a claim by the owners of BG Plaza in Beaverton that Mayor Denny Doyle during a private meeting Friday told them the city is no longer interested in condemning the property to make room for a baseball stadium.

“The Mayor told us he that the city no longer wants to consider condemnation … ,” Domonic Biggi said in a release issued Monday afternoon by his family, which owns the Cedar Hills Boulevard office/retail complex.

But on the heels of the Biggi release came one from the city in which Doyle said the meeting was little more than a “get-acquainted” chat, with “no commitments” made by anyone.”

The problem is that the meeting was private. So Doyle doesn’t feel it’s appropriate, or necessary, to comment further on what was — or wasn’t — said, according to Amy Miner, the city’s public information manager.

For Gino Biggi, Domonic’s father, the debate is moot. No matter what Doyle did or didn’t say, Gino Biggi said he believes the city eventually will try to condemn the Plaza property as part of a plan to create new home for the Portland Beavers when they lose their current base at PGE Park in Portland in 2011.

During a council meeting Monday night, however, Gary Brentano, the city’s business services development director, said the city’s studying four possible places in Beaverton where the stadium could be placed.

Gino Biggi has his own idea about where the city should put the stadium, specifically on a chunk of land behind the Beaverton Transit Center. Biggi and other members of his family own small pieces of land there, which could be combined with land that a trailer park and a residential complex sit on to total about 17 acres, he said.

The one place he won’t willingly stand for the city putting a stadium, however, is in a location that would include BG Plaza. He purchased the property in the 1940s, he said, and for years the property was a losing deal. Now, however, with the Plaza paid off and about 85 percent of space there leased out, Biggi’s finally reaping the benefits of what he says was a lifetime of investment.

“That (property) pays me a hell of a lot of money,” he said, “a hell of a lot. It’s not for sale.”

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