By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews.com
A development in downtown Yachats that has sat partially completed for 13 years and labeled an “eyesore” by one Planning Commission member, may be on its way to finally being finished.
The commission voted unanimously Tuesday, Nov. 16 to authorize a conditional use permit for Doug Sowden of Eugene to complete construction of his Sunset Village project.
The conditional use permit – not needed when Sowden started the project in 2005 – will allow him to have the first floor of the renewed project dedicated to retail space and the second and third floors for condominiums.
Half of the retail/condo project was completed in 2008 when a recession hit. But the concrete foundation and walls for the second phase has sat without any other work on them since then.
Now Sowden is preparing to finish the project, he told the Planning Commission last week. He later declined to offer any other details to YachatsNews.
City planner Katherine Guenther told the commission that Sowden needed a conditional use permit to complete the project because in 2011 the city changed its ordinances to have developers seek permission if they wanted to build a new structure with residential on top of commercial.
Sowden told the commission his plans for the rest of the project are the same as the first phase – two retail spaces on the ground floor and using the second and third floors for condos. He said there is a potential for the southernmost structure to be completely residential – something he does not need the city’s permission to do.
“Nothing else is changing,” he said. “The look will be the same.”
Property owners along Center Way to the immediate east of the project asked the commission to not allow parking on that street. Sowden and Guenther said there is ample space in the condominium driveways that it should not be an issue. If there are complaints, they would fall under the city’s code enforcement process.
The commission said a request to require screening and handling of garbage and recycling cans should be handled by the development’s homeowner’s association, of which Sowden is the manager.
But commissioner Jacqueline Danos asked if the city should require a performance bond to ensure completion of the project should Sowden be unable to finish it.
“What if construction starts, something happens and ‘Oops, we can’t finish this again’,” Danos said. “We’ve already say with an eyesore in the middle of this community for more than a decade.”
But that raised questions from Guenther and commissioner Helen Anderson of how that would work and what it would accomplish. And if Sowden didn’t want to buy a performance bond and was not issued a conditional use permit, he could simply build a three-story condominium building, they said.
“Mixed use benefits Yachats …” said commissioner Christine Orchard.
Danos’ motion to require a performance bond was turned down on a 4-1 vote. That was quickly followed by an unanimous vote to approve the conditional use permit, which must be put into use within a year.
Sowden still has to file his site and building plans with the city and Lincoln County.
In other business the commission:
- Approved a conditional use permit to Charles and Donna Reed to operate a one-bedroom bed and breakfast operation in their three-story house at the west end of Coolidge Lane. Their “Glass House Bed & Breakfast” would be the third such operation in the city and comes under much stricter and different regulations than vacation rentals.
