Far Southwest Neighborhood Association (FSWNA) Minutes
Tuesday, July 10, 2007 (7 pm to 8:15 pm)
Comfort Suites Motel - Barbur Blvd., Portland, Oregon
Guests: Linda Gerber (PCC Sylvania Campus President), Bob Ochs (Bureau of Technology Services Project Manager), Matt Lamp (Bureau of Technology Services Engineer?), and Ken Goodwin (PCC Director of Public Safety)
[Note: FSWNA belongs to the neighborhood coalition group Southwest Neighborhoods, Inc or SWNI. For more information, see http://swni.org ]
I. Highlights from the PCC Sylvania Campus President (Linda Gerber)
Sustainability is one of PCC's priorities. PCC District President Preston Pulliams just signed the President's Climate Commitment (http://www.presidentsclimatecommitment.org/) committing PCC to reduce carbon emissions and to adopt more sustainable practices. Some practices to accomplish this commitment include: encouraging habitat restoration (such as the Sylvania Habitat Team's work in Sylvania Natural Area Park and on campus); improving recycling efficiency; encouraging reduced resource usage; improving transportation options, including working with Trimet; and incorporating better building operations and practices.
Some new programs have been established, such as an engineering program about alternative energy technologies.
Sylvania is planning a community garden (aka "learning garden") on campus that will begin small, but eventually the college hopes to invite the neighbors to adopt plots.
Sylvania wants to help build stronger relationships with surrounding schools, such as Markham, Jackson, and Wilson. Some dual credit (HS & PCC) courses and advising are currently offered. Linda wants students to be familiar and comfortable with PCC before they graduate from high school.
Linda hopes to collaborate more internally and externally with the community, such as encouraging the use of the community education classes, Performing Arts Center and athletic facilities.
Sylvania would like to work with our neighborhood, SWNI, and the city to support and develop our security and emergency response services.
Linda is open to speaking with neighbors. Call 503-977-4357 to make sure that she is in and she will try very hard to meet with you. Her email is linda.gerber@pcc.edu .
II. Installation of a Public Safety Antenna at PCC Sylvania (Bob Ochs and Matt Lamp)
Matt reviewed some of the history of 800 MHz communications in Portland and how Portland needs to move into the digital age within a few years. When this change happens, the city also hopes to become compatible with statewide communications. Reconfiguration of antennae has increased radio coverage, but the terrain in SW Portland creates "holes" in reception and sending radio messages. Our neighborhood has been in a radio "deadzone" making all services (police, fire, ambulance, trimet, ODOT, PDOT, PCC, etc.) difficult to contact. To help address this problem, a new antenna is planned. Matt and Bob showed us several photos of where the new antenna will go in the woods on the north side of PCC Sylvania's main entrance and gave us mocked up views of what the antenna will look like.
Bob reviewed the land use (LU) and construction schedules. They have 30 days from signature of a contract with PCC Sylvania to submit their plans for LU review. The LU review takes 103 days. Thirty days after submittal, the city can receive bids for construction. Construction can begin 163 days (~5 months) from signing the contract and the construction should take 60-90 days to complete.
The city would own the tower on the college's land, but the college can "sell" the tower to other companies as long as their services do not interfere with the main safety purposes. The antenna does have a capacity limit and frequencies must be considered as well. Bob and Matt were both unsure whether Metrofi, the city's wi-fi contractor, would be allowed access to this antenna.
The antenna is a 120 foot tall pole with 3 antennae. The color will be determined by the Land Use review. The pole will be planted in a concrete pad with pillars, surrounded by a fence topped with barbed wire, and small sheds within the fence will be available for city and possibly college use.
III. Public Safety at Sylvania (Ken Goodwin)
Ken wants to build a mutually beneficial relationship with the neighborhood. The college has supported the building of the emergency services tower antenna, using the college facilities for training in emergency response, and using the college facilities for an emergency shelter.
Ken wanted the neighborhood to be aware of two crimes. An armed robbery occurred on 7/2/07 at 9:20 pm in the parking lot near the track. A strong-arm robbery occurred a month or two ago in the HT men's locker room. In both instances, the perpetrators were described similarly although the recent robbery involved three perpetrators and the first involved two. The perpetrators were African American or dark skinned men in hooded sweatshirts and were in their mid-twenties. In the recent robbery, after obtaining the money, the men ran into our neighborhood through the chain link gate opening nearer to the 78 bus stop and stop sign.
IV. Report from our neighborhood police officer (Davis Kile)
Officer Kile told us that our neighborhood only had 4 phone calls to the police in June (2 regarding a runaway situation, 1 regarding a threat, and 1 regarding theft from a motor vehicle), which is considered very low. He strongly supports installation of the new communications tower for better service access and safety. He also encourages our neighborhood to "be their eyes." Observe activities in our neighborhood and report detailed information regarding crimes in progress or any suspicious activity to the police.
V. SWNI Updates (Marcia Leslie)
Marcia attends the monthly SWNI Board meetings representing our neighborhood. Here are the SWNI updates.
The city of Portland set goals to increase recycling by 75% by 2015, to decrease greenhouse gases, to eventually compost residential food scraps with yard debris, and to require businesses to recycle all paper and food scraps.
All SWNI neighborhood and committee action plans for 2007-2008 were approved. New SWNI officers were installed as well. All of these officers, neighborhoods, and committees are described in the Southwest News. Call (503) 823-4592 if your SW household does not receive this free newspaper, but would like to.
The SWNI board sent a letter to Metro advocating the use of greenspace funds to buy portions of the Riverview cemetary (a seismically and environmentally sensitive area), which has been proposed for multi-unit residential development.
The city is looking for courtyard housing design footprints. Courtyard housing is an alternative to condominiums with shared courtyards in the center that are attractive to families. See "infill design events" at http://www.portlandonline.com.
Events! 7/25/07, 8/1/07, and 8/7/07 are free summer concert days at Willamette Park (Linda Hornbuckle, Flat Mountain Girls, and Michael Manning and the Carolina Pump Station, respectively). 8/18/07 is the Multnomah Days Celebration (see http://www.multnomahvillage.org/joomla/content/view/16/42/). 8/3/07 and 9/1/07 are Multnomah Village Outdoor Cinema evenings (Jurassic Park and O Brother Where Art Thou, respectively).
The graffiti hotline is (503) 823-4824. Please photograph graffiti before it is cleaned off. If you observe graffiti "artists" in action, call 911.
West Portland Park Neighborhood is making a request regarding truck braking on I-5.
Commissioner Sam Adams will be having a follow up meeting to his June transportation Town Hall. Possibly, increased gas taxes or a street maintenance fee on property taxes could be implemented to pay for road improvements.
VI. Parks Update (April Fong)
The PCC Sylvania Habitat Restoration Team received two grants: a Bureau of Environmental Services Community Watershed Stewardship Program grant (CWSP) and a Metro Nature in Neighborhoods grant (NIN). Both grants will continue restoration in Sylvania Natural Area Park. The NIN grant will also begin to develop a PCC/Parks/Markham/Jackson/SUN program relationship by developing an 8-week nature class to be offered through Markham SUN school and events in Sylvania Natural Area Park and/or the Holly Farm Park on Portland Public Schools Days Off and once each in August 2007 and 2008. If you'd like to get involved, we're recruiting volunteers!
The Holly Farm Park is hoping to have its opening and dedication on September 15, 2007 at 3:00 pm.
VI. Next Meeting and Adjournment
FSWNA meets on the second Tuesday of every other month at the Comfort Suites. Our next meeting is scheduled for September 11, 2007 from 7:00 pm to 8:00 pm.