FLOCK Gabriel <br />From: Mary Leighton <leighton.mary@gmail.com> <br />Sent: Monday, August 22, 2016 2:30 PM <br />To: FLOCK Gabriel <br />Cc: SATRE Rick (SMTP); SCHIRMER Carol (SMTP) <br />Subject: Continued Support for Cathedral Park Development <br />This letter confirms my continued support for the Cathedral Park Development on the south end of property <br />owned by Charles Wiper, Inc. I live at 4046 Normandy Way, about a block west of the proposed development. <br />My support is based on recognition <br />® that affordable housing is a community asset in short supply, <br />® that this property could easily handle a well-designed project with a higher residential density than the <br />surrounding areas, and <br />® that we would all be well served to add to the socioeconomic diversity in this corner of the community. <br />As a career educator and education policy researcher, retired from being a local public school administrator, I <br />know that the local schools could readily be equipped to handle the increased enrollment that I hope the <br />Cathedral Park homes would provide. Indeed it would be much cheaper to incorporate a moderate number of <br />lower-income students in the schools in this neighborhood than to concentrate them in other schools. There is <br />no academic downside for students with abundant home resources when we add other kinds of students to the <br />mix, according to well-established research on student achievement. <br />Among the resources abundantly available in our community are well trained City Planners, expert planning <br />consultants, nonprofit agencies with deep experience in affordable housing development, investors willing to <br />put their own money into meeting the need for affordable housing, and neighborhoods like ours that are rich in <br />the social and economic resources that can make a place good to live. We must all work together to make this <br />project happen, to meet the challenges presented by our improving appreciation of what good stewardship of the <br />environment requires, by our need to behave like good neighbors, and by the unmet demand for homes that <br />families with modest incomes can afford. <br />Regardless of the decision about this particular appeal, I look forward to the progress that can be made by all <br />concerned with prudent attention both to planning well and to meeting the needs of our diverse community. <br />This project can and should be happening in my back yard. <br />Mary Leighton <br />4046 Normandy Way <br />Eugene, OR 97405 <br />