Mt. Tabor parks facilities

This past fall, neighbors discovered Portland Parks & Recreation (PPR), the City bureau responsible for parks and open space, had entered into an agreement with Warner Pacific College to sell land currently used for maintenance facilities at Mt. Tabor Park. After huge public outcry, the deal was voided. The Commissioner-in-charge of PPR, Dan Saltzman, claimed he had no knowledge of the proposed sale. Since he meets regularly with Zari Santner, who serves as the professional manager of the bureau, I find that hard to believe. If he didn’t, he should have. What else would they talk about, that could be more important? If Ms. Santner signed an agreement to sell public property, independently without his knowledge, he should have fired her. He did not. Zari Santner is an intelligent, savvy professional with many years’ experience working with several different commissioners-in-charge of Parks. It’s inconceivable to me that she would not have kept her boss informed of such an important issue.

As an aside, thinking of the current discussions regarding changing Portland’s form of government to having all bureau managers reporting the Mayor and Chief Administrative Officer: If an elected official with three bureaus (Parks, Cable franchises, and Sustainable Development) plus the Children’s Investment Fund under his authority, claims he was unable to track the actions of the professional manager appointed to run one of those bureaus, how would a Mayor and CAO have time to oversee the managers of all twenty-three bureaus?

Anyway, moving on. PPR’s version of what happened and plans for a public process to discuss the future of the Mt. Tabor maintenance facilities says there will be meetings in February, but the web page is outdated and doesn’t give the new schedule. It does link to a Draft Framework (pdf) for the public process, estimated to run for several months.

So in the meantime, the citizens most involved in tracking this issue – Cascade Anderson Geller, Mark Bartlett, and Shannon Loch – are holding a public meeting this coming Tuesday, to inform interested neighbors from all over the city on their research and concerns. They say:

“Hear updates on actions related to Mt. Tabor Park Central Maintenance Yard and the adjacent plant and tree nurseries, at a community sponsored meeting next Tuesday, February 6, 2007.

Add your ideas and thoughts about the highest and best use of this special area of Mt. Tabor Park, that for the last century has been central to ensuring the preservation of our beautiful and historic park landscapes.

Results from our brainstorming session will be forwarded to the city.”

This is the second community-sponsored meeting regarding PPR actions concerning the Mt. Tabor Park central maintenance yard and nursery. The meeting will be run by a volunteer facilitator, with several neighborhood parks volunteers/advocates presenting information based on City documents the neighborhood leaders have been reading over the last few months, and meetings with City staff. The wider issue of the overall facilities plan for citywide parks maintenance will be reviewed. If PPR moves the central yard, the replacement figure has been set at more than $40m – although that estimate seems to have been proposed by a team of primarily real estate and related businesses, with no engineering firms involved, and the final cost to taxpayers might be higher.

People who are interested in Mt. Tabor Park, the yard, nursery, and what the loss of public property can mean to PPR and the city in general may wish to attend. Note, though, that this meeting is not part of PPR’s process and city staff will not be providing their perspective on the information presented.

My Neighborhood Association, West Portland Park, passed a motion at the end of 2006 in support of neighborhoods in Southeast concerned about Mt. Tabor Park, widening the issue to its citywide significance. Last week, the SW Neighborhoods, Inc., (SWNI) Parks Committee passed a motion forwarded to the SWNI Board for consideration, stating that no public property should be sold by the City without a full public process and three independent appraisals. I’m unable to attend the citizens’ forum on Tuesday as it conflicts with the Coalition for a Livable Future bi-monthly meeting discussing the proposed new Columbia River bridge, so I’ll be interested to hear from anyone who participates.