Sean C. Morgan
The Sweet Home City Council agreed Feb. 24 to send a letter to the Linn County Board of Commissioners confirming its support for transferring some 220 acres of former Knife River property to the Sweet Home Economic Development Group.
The land is owned by Linn County, which foreclosed on it after six years of nonpayment of property taxes by Western States Land Reliance Trust, which owed about $500,000. Since the foreclosure, Knife River has worked with the county to assess and clean up environmental issues on the property.
Last August, Linn County Commissioner Roger Nyquist suggested that SHEDG ask the county Board of Commissioners to deed the land to SHEDG.
Following several months of research into the history and issues with the property, on Jan. 27 SHEDG officially asked the Board of Commissioners to deed the property to SHEDG.
Commissioner John Lindsey told SHEDG he would not vote for the proposal if the City Council did not put in writing its support for the proposal and acknowledgment that the city would not recover unpaid taxes in connection to the property.
SHEDG board members hope to use the property as a home for the annual Oregon Jamboree and other activities, and they intend to seek input from the community about how to use the property.
“Our vision, it’s the community,” said Rachel Kittson-MaQatish, a SHEDG director who chairs the group’s Property Committee, which is overseeing the Knife River acquisition. “It’s just ripe with opportunity for the community.”
SHEDG would serve as a conduit for the property to the community to determine a use for the property outside SHEDG’s narrow lens of camping and the Oregon Jamboree, she said.
Councilor Ryan Underwood asked Kittson-MaQatish about a 2011 letter from then-Mayor Craig Fentiman to the county expressing interest in the property. He asked what has changed the county’s perception and led to an invitation to pursue the property.
Nyquist told the council last week that the county and city had discussed the property and collectively concluded that it had enough complications that the county should move forward with the property.
The city, he said, has been interested in keeping it accessible for the community, Nyquist said.
Since that time, the county and SHEDG also had discussed the possible development of a park there with an amphitheater for the Jamboree.
If the city wants to take title to the property, Nyquist said, the commissioners would be happy to have the conversation.
“But we’re quite a ways down the road with your economic development group,” Nyquist said.
SHEDG officials have been working with the county attorney on details of the transfer since meeting with the Board of Commissioners.
Councilor Jeff Goodwin asked about whether the past due taxes are owed.
“The money’s not coming,” Nyquist said. The only way the city would receive money from the property is if it were sold at auction. The county would keep the $300,000 to $400,000 it has spent so far on the property. After that, proceeds would be divided among taxing districts, the largest of which is the city.
Goodwin said the proposal is a good thing, but he wanted to make sure it’s developed with long-term community access in mind and just used once a year for camping.
Jamboree Festival Director Erin Regrutto said it will be used for camping, initially, but the goal has been a community park-type setting kept in public hands with the Jamboree there.
The Jamboree would not move there from its current site at Sweet Home High School by 2016, Regrutto said. Her goal is to move the event and most of the camping there within the next three years.
SHEDG officials believe the property’s zoning is compatible for what the organization wants to do initially, said SHEDG President John Wittwer.
The property would remain bound by zoning and a master plan, said City Manager Craig Martin, and any changes to either would require the owner to go before the Planning Commission.
The council voted 5-0 to send a letter of support to the Linn County Board of Commissioners.
Present at the meeting were Underwood, Goodwin, Greg Mahler, Dave Trask and Mayor Jim Gourley. Bruce Hobbs and Marybeth Angulo were absent.