Portland, Oregon Wednesday, April 6, 1994 Neighborhood Blocks A Home For Homeless Families Apartment plan appeals cite environmental regulations By Julie Sterling This month, the Wilson Neighborhood Association will have spent three full years working to derail the construction of a 31-unit apartment building for homeless families. The avowed defeat of the Turning Point project, which could have provided short-term housing for at least 375 families since its might-have-opened date ( December 1991 ), seems to satisfy the neighbors as a just cause to pursue from their comfortable residences near Wilson High School. In fact they will toast their efforts on a winery tour of Yamhill County April 23. "All proceeds," says the Southwest Neighborhood News in its March issue, "will be used to pay for Wilson Neighborhood Association legal fees in our case against the Housing Authority of Portland." Cost of the tour is $35. The Turning Point, a first for Portland, would be built and owned by the housing authority on donated land on the west side of Southwest Bertha Boulevard at Chestnut Street. Homelessness among families with children has increased dramatically in recent years. Of 401 persons denied shelter because of lack of space one night last November, "the great majority...were families with children and women with children escaping domestic violence," wrote Chuck Currie, chairman of the Multnomah County Community Action Commission, in The Oregonian February 16 [1994]. The Turning Point project would offer families like those something more than a night in a shelter or two weeks in a motel. It would give them a decent living environment - sleeping and cooking faclities in a secure two-story, landscaped building - while they receive counseling, job training and help in finding permanent housing. Kay Durtschi, who is president of Southwest Neighborhood Information Association among its 16 members, characterizes the dispute among its 16 members, characterizes the dispute as a stand-off between environmentalists and homeless advocates. Gerry Newhall chairman of the Friends of Turning Point, disagrees: It's a NIMBY ( Not in My Back Yard ) issue. The Wilson Neighborhood Associatlon, she contends, underwent an "environmental conversion" in the early stages of the dispute when it became clear that fighting the case on a NIMBY platform would not be politically or socially acceptable. The May 1991 issue of Southwest Neighborhood News, reporting on an April 4 meeting of the Wilson group, said residents at the early meeting "questioned why such a project was being considered for a largely middle and upper-middle-class neighborhood ... They expressed fears about increased crime and lowered property values," A letter to the editor in the Oregonian April 20, 1991, quoted one of the Wilson group as saying, "Why are people of lesser means brought in here, just to see what they can't have?" Early on, the housing authority successfully countered NIMBY arguments with assurances that the facility would have 24-hour, on-site management and an average residency of 60 days. But since then, the Wilson neighbors have tossed so many environmental grenades at the housing authority that the agency must be tempted to build a bunker on the thorny site instead of housing. There's no question that the site is environmentally sensitive. Part of it is an easement for storm water detention and part is a wetland. A small creek runs through its layers of brambles. And there's no doubt that the neighbor's environmental strategy has reaped delays and heaped legal fees on lawyers for both sides. But the housing authority argues that every objection raised is satisfied in a series of conditions it has accepted, including an argument to build outside the wetland. As to questions of runoff disposal, the Turning Point development would not change the overall capicity of the storm-water detention area, according to city findings. If anything, the Turning Point project would enhance the neighborhood. The housing authority would dedicate 72 percent of the site - the part that will remain untouched - for a park. The proposal has survived a minefield of appeals - from the City Council to the state Land Use Board of Appeals, to the Oregon Court of Appeals to the Oregon Supreme Court - so the housing authority had every reason to celebrate October 1, [1993] when the City Council approved the Turning Point site for conditional use. But in early February, the Wilson group filed its fifth appeal. Now the neighborhood challenges the evidence the city and the housing authority gathered to substantiate three issues singled out by the Land Use Board of Appeals for further council review. Chairman Wesley Risher says the Wilson Neighborhood Association is prepared to go to the federal level in its effort to make sure that the Turning Point "is built in accordance with federal requirements and mandates, because it is receiving federal funding." He believes it does not meet standards set by the National Historical Preservation Act, the Clean Water Act, the Americans With Disabilities and the National Environmental Policy Act. He could well cite one more well-known act: The Turning Point project was a bright hope for homeless families three years ago; today it is an endangered species. - end -