July 9, 2018 <br />Hearing Officer Fred Wilson <br />c/o Rodney T. Bohner <br />City of Eugene Planning and Development Department <br />99 W 10th Ave, Eugene, OR 97401 <br />rodney.t.bohner@ci.eugene.or.us <br />Re: Lombard Apartments project <br />Dear Mr. Wilson and Mr. Bohner: <br />This letter expands on the testimony I gave orally at the public hearing on June 27, 2018, regarding the <br />proposed Lombard Apartments project. <br />With its 94 apartment units, 127 parking spaces, and other structures and impervious surfaces covering <br />more than 60% of this property, which is wholly contained within the Willamette River Greenway, the <br />Lombard Apartments project is ill-suited to this site, as I further describe below. The project design <br />includes edge-to-edge development calling for the removal of 28 mature trees and hundreds of square <br />feet of lush wetland vegetation, and leaves barely 15% of the property as open space. As designed, this <br />project clearly is maximizing for developed area and profit rather than maximizing for open space and <br />vegetation, as required by Oregon state law and City of Eugene policies and review criteria regarding <br />uses within the Greenway. <br />The Lombard Apartments project has other serious flaws, including public safety related to access to <br />the site, and water quality impacts related to impervious coverage. Furthermore, the reasons given by <br />Homes for Good, the present owner of the property, explaining why they need to sell the property, are <br />suspect and should be questioned. Other options for using this property need to be considered. <br />In offering my comments on the proposed project, I come with a background of 33 years of public <br />service in land use planning and natural resources protection. Prior to moving to Eugene in 2008, I was <br />the Natural Resources Program Manager for the California Tahoe Conservancy for 22 years, where I <br />worked to protect and restore environmentally sensitive lands. Before that, I was a senior land use <br />planner for the Association of Bay Area Governments in Oakland, California, specializing in surface <br />runoff management and water quality planning. <br />Since becoming a homeowner in the River Road neighborhood in February 2011, I ride my bicycle past <br />the project site almost daily on the Ruth Bascom River Bank Trail. Both the Greenway and the River <br />Bank Trail are unique and critically important resources that majorly contribute to making Eugene a <br />special place to live. As proposed, the project will have serious negative impacts on both the Greenway <br />and the River Bank Trail. These impacts can be mitigated in small but significant ways by modifying <br />-1- <br />138 <br /> <br />