Green Party Watch

1 response to Oregon City Commissioner James Nicita, a registered Green, ‘faces recall effort’ over opposition to a new mall

1. 

   James Nicita said on July 28, 2011

   Some of the background on the issues behind the recall effort are in my latest constituent letter, appended below, and in these two articles (and the comments from citizens afterward):

   http://www.oregonlive.com/oregon-city/index.ssf/2011/07/oregon_city_commissioner_james_nicita_faces_a_recall_effort_spurred_by_his_opposition_to_a_proposed.html

   http://www.oregoncitynewsonline.com/news/story.php?story_id=131179124358708600

   I don’t know if this website automatically creates hyperlinks out of web address texts, so folks might have to copy and past the links into their browsers.

   If this website can post pdf documents, I can provide the paper I wrote on alternative scenarios for development of the area around the historic End of the Oregon Trail, which proposed alternatives to the big-box mall.

   Jim Nicita
   City Commissioner
   Oregon City, Oregon
   Member, Pacific Green Party

   —–Original Message—–
   From: James Nicita [mailto:jnicita@ci.oregon-city.or.us]
   Sent: Tuesday, July 19, 2011 7:23 PM
   To: James Nicita
   Subject: Constutent Letter from City Commissioner James Nicita: Follow-Up on
   Deliberations on The Rivers

   The Oregon City News ran this article regarding the impasse that occurred
   between the owner of the Rossman landfill and the developer of the proposed
   Rivers Mall:

   http://www.oregoncitynewsonline.com/news/story.php?story_id=1309295058784063
   00

   As the article points out, there are other parties now expressing interest
   in developing the Rossman landfill site. In addition to Mr. Duyn of Macadam
   Forbes, mentioned in the article, e-mails from city staff indicate staff has
   had meetings with Mr. James Kyung of Parkland Development Co., and with
   Growth Design, Inc., the firm I mentioned in a previous constituent letter
   that had expressed an interest in the Blue Heron mill property.

   My next constituent letter will discuss moving forward on economic
   development matters. In this e-mail, I would like to mention a few items
   regarding the recent discussions regarding the proposed Rivers project.

   I. Executive Session Transcripts Regarding Negotiations on The Rivers

   There was a lot of interest in the community regarding the negotiations that
   were going on regarding the proposed Rivers project. People wanted to know
   what was going on, but the urban renewal commission was undertaking its
   deliberations on the proposed development agreement in executive sessions
   that were closed to the public.

   The urban renewal commission can make the decision to waive the privileged
   nature of the executive session meetings. In light of the significant
   interest in the matter, I am in favor of having the urban renewal commission
   order transcripts of the executive session meetings, and releasing them to
   the public. In that way, citizens can make their own determination on how
   well urban renewal commissioners, staff, and legal counsel were advancing
   and protecting the citizens’ interests in these deliberations.

   II. Urban Renewal and Sales Price of the Rossman Landfill

   The Oregon City News article quotes the developer of the proposed mall as
   saying, “Price is always an issue, and one of the reasons we needed urban
   renewal was the price of the land.”

   If the quote is accurate, it highlights one of the (many and significant)
   issues the urban renewal commission had to grapple with in its deliberations
   over the use of urban renewal for this project.

   In 2008, Leland Consulting and GEL Oregon prepared a staff report for The
   Rivers Project. An excerpt from that staff report is attached, and includes
   a table in which the developer’s financial estimates for the project include
   a figure of approximately $7.2 million for “Property Costs”; both
   acquisition and demolition.

   On the other hand, the Oregon City News article provides an estimate of $12
   million for the price of the Rossman landfill; although it is not possible
   to know what two private parties – the landowner and the developer -
   discussed in terms of a purchase price.

   But, if as a hypothetical matter, the purchase price would have been in,
   say, the $12-$15 million range, a significant question would then arise for
   the URC as to whether urban renewal would or should be used, at least in
   part, to augment the purchase price of the Rossman landfill.

   The only way, it seems, to even begin the discussion to make such a
   determination on this matter was for the URC to make a signed sales
   agreement — which would include a concrete purchase price – a prerequisite
   to the consideration of using urban renewal.

   The URC did make that a prerequisite (for a number of reasons); then, the
   landowner and the developer were not able to reach an agreement.

   The same issue will almost certainly arise if any subsequent proposal for
   developing the Rossman landfill involves a request for the use of urban
   renewal.

   It might not be out of the realm of possibility that under some futuere
   scenario the citizens of Oregon City would find such a hypothetical
   augmentation of sales price acceptable for a particular development
   proposal. In my opinion, however, that sentiment should be recorded in a
   public vote, after full and complete provision of information.

   III. The Great Incinerator Myth

   One interesting lesson for me during the debates on The Rivers was regarding
   how myths get generated and propagated. Because it might not be the last
   time that such a mythmaking will be injected into Oregon City’s political
   discourse, I want to explore it a bit.

   In this case the myth, propagated by some opponents of my position that
   citizens should have the right to vote on the issuance of urban renewal debt
   for large projects like the proposed Rivers mall, is that my alternative
   idea was to build a trash incinerator on the site where the Rivers would be
   constructed.

   This spring, the Oregon City News ran an editorial correcting its role in
   the generation of this myth, based on a paper I had written on alternative
   development scenarios for the North End of downtown:

   http://www.oregoncitynewsonline.com/opinion/story.php?story_id=1300220202908
   25000

   As this editorial indicates, a handful of people who knew for a fact that I
   had not proposed siting an incinerator on the Rossman landfill – the site of
   the proposed Rivers mall – yet nevertheless propagated the myth.

   For example, I had sent the paper mentioned in the editorial to my fellow
   members of the Urban Renewal Commission, and we had discussed it during a
   URC meeting. Nevertheless, two URC members, Brian Shaw and Doug Neeley,
   picked up on and spread the myth. I outlined this myth propagation last year
   in an e-mail to the Oregonian appended at the bottom of this constituent
   letter.

   Two other examples of spreading the myth are notable:

   A. Former Mayor Dan Fowler

   Former mayor Dan Fowler has extensive land holdings near the Rossman
   landfill, as outlined by another former mayor, John Williams noted in this
   opinion piece:

   http://www.oregonlive.com/oregon-city/index.ssf/2011/03/my_turn_critic_of_or
   egon_city_urban_renewal_vote_has_land_holdings_near_the_rivers_that_raise_et
   hica.html

   I do not have a record of my personal conversations with Mr. Fowler
   regarding my paper, but I do have a record of his presence at a Citizens
   Involvement Council meeting on January 4, 2010 (minutes attached), at which
   I presented my paper in detail, including my vision of using plasma-arc
   gasification technology to remove the Rossman landfill and restore the
   historic Abernethy Green. As the Oregon City News editorial correctly
   infers, I did not want to put an incinerator on the Rossman landfill, and in
   particular where the Rivers mall would be built, because my proposal was to
   explore removing the landfill.

   Nevertheless, at the time of the public hearings on the proposed urban
   renewal right-to-vote charter amendment held this past January and February,
   Mr. Fowler used the incinerator-on-the-landfill myth in this editorial he
   published in the Oregonian:

   http://www.oregonlive.com/oregon-city/index.ssf/2011/01/my_turn_the_rivers_o
   regon_city.html

   He also attached his editorial to the following e-mail, which he distributed
   in order to organize people to get to the public hearings on the urban
   renewal charter amendment:

   ***************************************Beginning****************************

   —– Forwarded Message —-
   From: Dan Fowler
   Sent: Sat, January 29, 2011 3:18:08 PM
   Subject: Big Decisions for Oregon City

   To All,

   Oregon City has two BIG meetings this coming week and I NEED your help.
   There is an Urban Renewal Meeting 6 PM Monday the 31st at City Hall (corner
   of 7th and Center) and Wednesday night Feb. 2nd 7 PM at the Pioneer
   Community Center the City Commission will be taking up Charter amendments
   and one could stop “The Rivers” project. They are rushing into these issues
   and we need to show them the majority of the people in the area want jobs
   not delays. We need a crowd! Please read my attached letter to the editor.
   Also attached is an informational flyer on the project. If you can be there
   do so and bring people. Anyone is welcome to speak but it is not necessary
   but it is important we have a good showing for both meetings. Invite
   people. Pass this on to anyone who might be supportive and live in Oregon
   City.

   Thank you,

   Dan Fowler

   *****************************************End********************************

   B. The Oregonian

   The worst perpetrator of the myth, though, in my mind, is the Oregonian. In
   theory, newspapers have an obligation to get the facts right and be
   objective in their reporting. Yet, the Oregonian freely repeated the
   incinerator-on-the-landfill myth in this February 18, 2011 article:

   http://www.oregonlive.com/oregon-city/index.ssf/2011/02/supporters_and_criti
   cs_of_the_rivers_make_their_claims_about_the_proposed_mall_–_heres_what_the
   yre.html

   I had sent the reporter Mr. Mayes only a few months previously the paper I
   wrote, attached to the below e-mail which included a long explanation that
   the incinerator myth was false. Yet he nevertheless actively participated in
   the mythmaking in the above article.

   ***************************************Beginning****************************
   From: James Nicita
   Sent: Wednesday, October 13, 2010 7:30 AM
   To: stevemayes@news.oregonian.com
   Cc: Doug Neeley; brian_d_shaw@msn.com; editor@clackamasreview.com
   Subject: Clarifying Commissioner Neeley’s incorrect statement

   Steve,

   Thanks for speaking with me briefly last night. Attached is my paper which I
   distributed last year on north end redevelopment.

   Colin wrote an article on the document, which quotes Doug as saying that it
   merits “major discussion:”

   http://www.oregonlive.com/clackamascounty/index.ssf/2009/11/oregon_city_nici
   ta_maps_out_vi.html

   So, presumably, Doug has actually read the document himself, and knows full
   well that the document does not call for an incinerator on top of the
   landfill, as he erroneously implied last night.

   The Oregon City News erroneously reported that the paper called for a waste
   to energy facility next to the Home Depot on the landfill site (namely,
   where the Rivers Mall would go), in the first paragraph of its article on
   the paper:

   http://www.clackamasreview.com/news/print_story.php?story_id=125968832215993
   700

   Ever since, I have unfortunately had to face accusations like Doug’s false
   accusation last night, as well as in Brian Shaw’s recent letter to the
   editor in the Oregon City News:

   http://www.clackamasreview.com/opinion/story.php?story_id=128571574690329900

   Later, I got the Oregon City News to run a clarification, as they did at the
   end of this article:

   http://www.clackamasreview.com/news/print_story.php?story_id=126876380235306
   200

   Generally, I think Doug has more integrity than he displayed last night.

   *****************************************End********************************

   The degree to which both the Oregonian and the Oregon City News get things
   wrong, at a basic, factual level, is concerning. This periodic constituent
   letter will probably from now on therefore include a section to fact-check
   what these media outlets are reporting about Oregon City.