The Portland City Council on Wednesday gave the go-ahead for city bureaus to continue working with private landowners to develop one of the largest remaining unbuilt parcels in the city.

Commissioners voted unanimously in favor of adopting the Parkrose-Argay Development Study, which calls for creation of a public-private partnership to develop the 32-acre Rossi Farms site – around the intersection of Northeast 122nd Avenue and Shaver Street, where the Parkrose and Argay neighborhoods meet. A series of public workshops were held over the past year to determine a preferred alternative that provides views of Mount Hood to the east. Plans call for nearly 750 new apartments, as many as 138 new townhomes, a handful of cottages, commercial space and a new grocery store along 122nd Avenue.

“Thank you, Mr. Rossi, to you and your associates for helping making this a really grand vision,” Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said. “This could have gone in a very different direction, but you really gave the template to the community to be able to shape this.”

The resolution approved by the City Council directs the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability to now work with the Rossi, Garre and Giusto families as well as Prosper Portland to “gauge interest in a future private-public partnership for development of the 32-acre site.”

Other city commissioners were equally enthusiastic.

“This site is so full of exciting potential,” Commissioner Chloe Eudaly said.

The 32 acres span both sides of 122nd Avenue and are near Parkrose High School, Parkrose Middle School and Shaver Elementary School.

The historic Rossi Farms red barn sits on the site and is likely to be repurposed as event space or something similar after public input showed strong support for the structure’s retention and reuse.

A total of six preliminary concept plans were devised by a work group featuring representatives of city agencies, the East Portland Action Plan, the Parkrose School District, Scott | Edwards Architecture, Walker Macy, Lancaster Engineering and others.

The yearlong process identified the View Corridor alternative as the most to the community. A new street would run diagonally through the east side of the site and toward Mount Hood to preserve and frame views of the mountain. Green spaces on either side of that main street would have even better views.

North-south streets envisioned to support mixed-use development would be oriented with views of Mount St. Helens in mind and be offset from connections to streets to the north to discourage cut-through vehicle traffic.

Barry Manning, a senior planner with the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, told commissioners that preliminary planning showed plenty of investment opportunity in the Parkrose/Argay area, albeit at perhaps a lower level of return than the central city.

Consultant “Johnson Economics felt that there was a pretty significant opportunity to develop rental apartments on this site,” Manning said. “This area hasn’t seen much new investment activity. The pricing of rents in the area doesn’t support concrete-podium construction but would support wood-frame construction.”

If the concept plan were to be implemented, the property owners would need to agree on a more formal mechanism to make decisions together. This could take a range of forms, such as a written agreement, or creation of a more formal legal entity.

A suitable developer with experience developing master plans on a large site will also need to be brought on board, along with the required variety of contractors involved in such an enterprise.

Joe Rossi spoke Wednesday on behalf of his family, which has owned the property in question for more than four generations. The family intends to work with the city to bring the concept plan to reality, he said.

“I can’t say enough how much this exceeded my expectations,” Rossi said. “We’re going to go all the way through on this. The first step was the zoning we got; we had really good public input in the zoning process. This was the second step, and the third step will be for us to come and stay involved.”

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The city of Portland is close to adopting a comprehensive plan for ensuring its lofty equity goals are employed on all city construction projects, after years of contentious debate.

But Wednesday’s hearing at City Hall showed the fight isn’t over for the new Community Equity and Inclusion Plan (CEIP), which Mayor Ted Wheeler’s office is calling one of the ambitious equity policies ever undertaken in Portland.

Dissatisfaction from longtime stakeholders was still present, but given the issue’s rancorous history in Portland, Wheeler’s plan may be close to the finish line.

“I bet a lot of you thought I was going to get up here and say bad things about it,” said James Posey, a contractor and longtime voice in equitable contracting in Portland. “But I’m not.”

Posey and nearly all of the two dozen others who testified said more work on the policy is needed. They asked for accountability for contractors who fail to live up to terms, a fine greater than $2,000 for failure to meet goals, and better data to ensure contractors don’t play with numbers to make a white, male workforce appear more diverse on paper.

Wheeler’s CEIP didn’t arrive at the hearing requiring the union-friendly policy tool known as Community Benefits Agreements (CBAs) on all projects – owners of projects over $25 million that use alternative contract methods are given the choice. This led to many speakers saying they could not support the policy as written.

“I urge you to not support this,” said Connie Ashbrook, executive director emeritus of Oregon Tradeswomen Inc.

The CEIP is intended to standardize equity requirements and keep project owners from having to devise new plans for each project. Currently, several city bureaus have their own plans, as do certain large capital projects. The CEIP was compiled with the help of various bureaus and is intended to provide a consistent approach to equitable contracting.

One issue that’s vexed Portland leaders going back to former mayor Bud Clark in the early 1990s is how to draft a policy like the CEIP that will stand up to legal challenges. City attorneys have warned that CBAs might increase diversity on city projects, but would put the city in a risky position.

The most charged issue in this arena going back to Wheeler’s predecessor, Charlie Hales, has been how to incorporate the signatory component of CBAs. Many people who’ve testified to the council have said this component is crucial to ensuring the engagement of stakeholder groups. These include industry-focused nonprofits like Oregon Tradeswomen, Constructing Hope, Portland Youth Builders, and the Metropolitan Alliance for Workforce Equity.

These groups, along with neighborhood organizations like the East Portland Action Plan, and construction worker unions under the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council have said the signatory requirement is critical because there needs to be a contractual relationship tying contractors to their promises.

“The problem with (the CEIP) is it doesn’t have any method of delivery for equity in workforce,” Willy Myers, executive director of the council, told the 91��Ƶ.

But contractors, including the heads of black-owned open-shop firms, and city project managers have expressed concerns about their obligations and the city’s enforcement ability.

The chief administrative officer under Charlie Hales, Fred Miller, was critical of CBAs. Miller retired at the end of last year. His successor, Tom Rinehart, along with the head of the Office of Equity and Human Rights, Dante James, have taken the lead devising the CEIP for Wheeler.

CBAs were used for two Portland Water Bureau projects, and not without controversy.

They were regarded as successful in achieving diverse worker and owner participation, but an independent report criticized several aspects of how they were used in the pilot projects, including project set-aside money going to things unrelated to the projects. The report, by Framework LLC, also said the CBAs were employed in ways that could provide the appearance of conflict of interest.

Miller said at the time he did not want “pure” CBAs used for the Portland Building reconstruction project, which his bureau was gearing up to take on.

Wheeler’s solution to address this dilemma is a CEIP-supporting document to be signed by contractors selected for city projects – a . It will effectively serve as the signatory document to the CEIP.

The scope of the partnership agreement is narrower than that of the CBAs piloted by the city. But Wheeler thinks it can achieve the right level of stakeholder engagement while keeping separate the contractual relationship between the city and its prime contractor.

The proposed fix is intended to allow both union and open-shop firms to compete for city projects, which for years has been a major sticking point in the conversation around equitable contracting. A number of local businesses belonging to the National Association of Minority Contractors are open shop, and some of their owners say it’s easier to hire from their communities absent unions. And they point out that unions haven’t always lived up to equity goals.

Commissioner Dan Saltzman introduced an amendment requiring CBAs for projects over $25 million. But because Saltzman introduced his amendment at the start of Wednesday’s hearing, no one in the room had prepared to address it. NAMC Oregon Executive Director Nate McCoy said he needed to check with people before publicly agreeing to support the amendment.

McCoy has said he favors an equity plan that allows all NAMC Oregon businesses to participate. He and national NAMC board member and Raimore Construction head Jeff Moreland sounded open to it on Wednesday.

“So, just to be clear,” Wheeler said, “with this amendment, we don’t lose you, Nate, and we get you, Willy?”

Seated at the same table, Myers and McCoy offered signs of assent to Wheeler’s question.

The CEIP would also establish a body – the Community Equity and Inclusion Committee – to oversee the city’s and its contractors’ performance. Not all of the CEIC’s formal duties have been assigned.

James, of the Office of Equity and Human Rights, said at the outset of the discussion that underlying all of Portland’s struggles to achieve diversity in contracting are racism and sexism.

“I want to be clear about this,” he said.

Wheeler’s office on Wednesday forwarded three resolutions relating to the CEIP. They will return to the City Council next month, when votes, including on the new amendments, will be taken.

“We have 30 days to figure this out,” Wheeler said.

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