West Gresham

COURTESY RENDERING: CITY OF GRESHAM - The Downtown Rockwood market hall, middle, has been redesigned to lower construction costs. Click to enlarge.

Source: The Gresham Outlook
Tuesday, May 26, 2020

Gresham Mayor Shane Bemis voices concerns about completing long-brewing development

By Christopher Keizur

A Rockwood development project that has been brewing for more than two decades is getting a redesign to keep construction costs in line with budget constraints.

The second phase of Downtown Rockwood — originally called Rockwood Rising — was for a market hall with an international grocery marketplace, public commissary kitchen, and small business and pop-up stand opportunities.

The Gresham Redevelopment Commission heard the proposed design changes for the building that had bloated past its cost estimates during a meeting Tuesday afternoon, May 19. The new market hall looks different, and adds 3,000 square feet of restaurant/grocery/retail space; 10,000 square feet of office space; and four additional micro-restaurants.

But officials said it maintains the original intent of uplifting the diverse community of food entrepreneurs who call Rockwood home.

"The new design offers more variety of spaces," said Emily Bower, interim executive director of the Gresham Redevelopment Commission.

COURTESY RENDERING: CITY OF GRESHAM - The new market hall has more space for businesses. Click to enlarge.

The new market hall has more space for businesses.The idea behind Downtown Rockwood is to bring new construction and needed services into the heart of the neighborhood. The Catalyst Site, located between Southeast Stark Street, Southeast 185th Avenue and East Burnside Street, will be a central square with a public plaza and play structures for kids, an innovation hub with services for locals, retail stores, apartments, and the market hall.

The 5.5-acre plot of land was initially purchased by the Gresham Development Commission in 2005 with funds from the city's urban renewal district. The city spent three years, from 2014-2016, soliciting ideas and feedback from residents in the neighborhood.

The project finally broke ground last summer, marking a shift from planning to actually seeing Downtown Rockwood come to fruition. Since then the former Rockwood Community Office Building was renovated and construction of the innovation hub should be complete by July.

Bower said the market hall should be completed by Summer 2021 — a timeline Gresham Mayor Shane Bemis voiced concerns about.

"I feel like we are constantly changing the program and have had the property tied up for years with little steps being made," Bemis said during the virtual meeting. "I want to get this project done and do these things we have been talking about for the last 20-plus years. I am really concerned about hitting timelines and delivering for our community."

Bower said complications the last two years led to the redesign. Developers said the Portland area has experienced historic increases in the costs of construction. That, coupled with new federal tariffs on construction material, led to the need for a redesign. The new building has been simplified to maximize the leasable area within the building to improve finances.

"I am confident we will finish this project in the 2021-22 timeline," Bower said.

This story first appeared in The Outlook. Support community newspapers. Subscribe at http://savinglocalnews.com

Lee Dayfield

Lee Dayfield says Metro-approved parks funding should not be used as an excuse by the city of Gresham to reduce parks funding. Meanwhile, stay-at-home orders ask that you only venture out for essential needs. Notably, access to public parks for exercise and fresh air while still practicing social distancing is among those allowed needs, and for good reasons.

Source: Pamplin Media Group
Thursday, April 16, 2020

If you have been out and about in our local parks and trails this past week you might have noticed how many of your neighbors are doing the same. It is not just the improving weather.

The pandemic has put a renewed premium on proximity to parks and nature. For those of us fortunate enough to have high quality public greenspace nearby, the value is especially self-evident. But long before this pandemic, research has demonstrated what people know intuitively: access to parks and nature is no simple frill or amenity, but an essential determinant of individual and community health.

Unfortunately, Gresham's City budget has made parks a low priority in recent years. Park investments made by Gresham voters a generation ago have not kept pace. To be sure, our community has many volunteers and private donors who make some parks shine.

Friends of Nadaka and the Gresham Japanese Garden are effectively harnessing volunteers and private donations; Ricki Ruiz continues to secure grants to develop futsal courts; and North Gresham Neighborhood Association is poised to build a playground at Kirk Park funded primarily through private donations.

However significant, these isolated projects belie systemic divestment. In recent years, fewer and fewer general fund dollars have gone to parks and recreation. Gresham's almost non-existent recreation programming leaves vital services to underfunded nonprofit organization like Gresham-based Play Grow Learn, which mentors at-risk adolescents using nature-play, urban gardening and athletics in our parks. Relying on nonprofits, grants, private donations, and the generosity of volunteers is not a sustainable path to a vibrant thriving parks and recreation system that bolsters our health and prosperity.

We can do a lot better.
Today, as the fourth largest city in Oregon, Gresham has the lowest per-capita investment in local parks and recreation in the Metro region.

In a hopeful turn, the majority of Gresham voters passed Metro's regional parks and nature funding measure in November 2019. The measure will infuse some additional capital funds into Gresham's local parks system. Public officials should not use that as an excuse to backfill further cuts to parks. Now is the time to launch a parks feasibility study of new local investment options and to give the community greater voice and vote in decisions with innovative tools like participatory budgeting.

As federal stimulus funds become available, Gresham would be wise to creatively invest in the city's backlog in park stewardship and deficient parks programming while putting people to work. The Nadaka Ambassador Program, which employs Rockwood residents to steward the park and garden, is a great model.

In these difficult and uneasy times, we must not lose sight of the value of stewarding our parks and nature which, now more than ever, are helping keep us healthy and connected.

Lee Dayfield is a parks advocate. In 2009, Friends of Nadaka, with Dayfield at the helm, organized the purchase and development of Nadaka Nature Park.

Let's Play Futsal! When: Sun, Mar 01, 2020 5PM-7PM Where: Friends of the Children Gym 424 NE 172nd Ave. Get Map!

Indoor Sunday Futsal youth recreation is open to all students in grades 6-12 on Sunday from 5:00-7:00 pm at the Friends of the Children gym.

• Free
• Open to boys and girls in grades 6-12
• Learn new skills, make new friends, play futsal
• Participants must bring a signed waiver to play
• Adult supervision and mentorship provided by Active Children Portland volunteers

For more information, email Ricki Ruiz at Ricardo.Ruiz@GreshamOregon.gov or call 503-583-0771.

Futsal flier and waiver

Read more about Sunday Futsal.

Don't Toss It. Let's Fix It! When: Sat, Mar 07, 2020 10AM-12:30PM Where: Habitat for Humanity ReStore 610 NE 181 Ave. Get Map!

Get your broken items fixed by community volunteers for free. The City of Gresham and Coalition of Neighborhood Associations are teaming up to bring people with repair skills together to help neighbors fix their broken items.

Types of household items repaired

• Broken bicycles, chains and tires
• Torn clothing, missing buttons and other fabric repairs
• Broken lamps, clocks, fans and small kitchen appliances
• Broken laptops, VCRs, DVD or CD players, printers, calculators, Gameboys and remote controls

Please note: Televisions, microwaves, sewing machines and small engines are not repairable at this event.

What to expect

• Try to bring anything that may be needed to repair your item; Parts, buttons, matching thread, power cords, batteries, connecting cables, remote controls, instructions manuals, etc.
• We try to help everyone who brings an item. If participants bring multiple items (allowed), we can only work on one item at a time and may not be able to fix more than one item per person.
• Our volunteer fixers will do their best to repair your item, but some repairs may be too complicated or require resources that aren't available at the event.
• The event is free. There may be a wait depending on the number of repairs.

Contact

For more information contact us at RepairCafeGresham@gmail.com or 503-618-2694.

Repair PDX

Gresham Repair Cafe

Let's Play Futsal! When: Sun, Mar 08, 2020 5PM-7PM Where: Friends of the Children Gym 424 NE 172nd Ave. Get Map!

Indoor Sunday Futsal youth recreation is open to all students in grades 6-12 on Sunday from 5:00-7:00 pm at the Friends of the Children gym.

• Free
• Open to boys and girls in grades 6-12
• Learn new skills, make new friends, play futsal
• Participants must bring a signed waiver to play
• Adult supervision and mentorship provided by Active Children Portland volunteers

For more information, email Ricki Ruiz at Ricardo.Ruiz@GreshamOregon.gov or call 503-583-0771.

Futsal flier and waiver

Read more about Sunday Futsal.

Let's Play Futsal! When: Sun, Mar 29, 2020 5PM-7PM Where: Friends of the Children Gym 424 NE 172nd Ave. Get Map!

Indoor Sunday Futsal youth recreation is open to all students in grades 6-12 on Sunday from 5:00-7:00 pm at the Friends of the Children gym.

• Free
• Open to boys and girls in grades 6-12
• Learn new skills, make new friends, play futsal
• Participants must bring a signed waiver to play
• Adult supervision and mentorship provided by Active Children Portland volunteers

For more information, email Ricki Ruiz at Ricardo.Ruiz@GreshamOregon.gov or call 503-583-0771.

Futsal flier and waiver

Read more about Sunday Futsal.

2020 Spring Newsletter "Diversity, Harmony, Community - Together 'WE' can make a difference!”

Read it now!

Spring 2020 Newsletter Inside This Issue: Pining for a Parks District Albertina Kerr Housing Update Wilkes East Land-Use Update Glisan Street Lane Reduction

Download your copy here. (includes active web links)

Newsletters are a regular publication of the Wilkes East Neighborhood Association. They are hand-delivered to over 1,500 residences and businesses in our area 3 times per year, timed to correspond with our regular meetings.

View archive   |   Policy & Ad Rates

Albertina Kerr Workforce and Inclusive Housing. Entry, Gresham campus. Click to enlarge.

By: Jeff Carr
CEO, Albertina Kerr
www.albertinakerr.org/

Albertina Kerr continues to move forward and make progress on its Workforce and Inclusive Housing Project to be located on the Gresham campus at 722 NE 162 Avenue. The project will include 150 units, from studios to 3 bedrooms. Since the November Wilkes East Neighborhood meeting where a presentation was made, significant progress has been made:

• Site due diligence was completed in December 2019 (Geotech, surveying, arborist report)
• A Design Review Consult was completed with the City of Gresham Community Design Review Committee in December 2019
• 100% Schematic Design was completed in early January 2020
  Submittals were completed for land use review in early January 2020
• Albertina Kerr hit the $1 million private fundraising mark in December 2020 and only needs $200,000 more in private donations to hit the total goal of $1.2 million in private donations.

One significant change since the November meeting is that we have decided to pursue making the building “net zero” from an energy use standpoint, which means we will be adding enhancements to make the entire building more energy efficient and producing energy via solar panels to provide enough energy to operate the entire building year-round.

The current timeline for the project is as follows:

We continue to be excited about this project and what it will mean for direct care workers at Albertina Kerr and others who care for some of the most vulnerable members of our community.

Architect Images

NE 162nd Ave view. Click to enlarge

NE Holladay St view. Click to enlarge

About Albertine Kerr
For more than 100 years, Albertina Kerr has been caring for Oregon’s most vulnerable citizens. Over the decades, our services have evolved to meet the community’s needs. While these needs have changed, the values of our expert caregivers remain constant: compassion, commitment, collaboration, and advocacy.

Today, Kerr empowers people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), mental health challenges, and other social barriers to lead self-determined lives and reach their full potential. We provide comprehensive crisis and preventative mental health care for children and teens, as well as a full range of services for children and adults with IDD.

Learn more at www.albertinakerr.org

Nadaka Nature Park won't have much of a reason to celebrate the new year.

PMG PHOTO: CHRISTOPHER KEIZUR - Lee Dayfield said a parks district funding mechanism is the best option for maintaining Nadaka Nature Park, which lost its fiscal agent and programming at the end of 2019. Click to enlarge

By Christopher Keizur
Source: Gresham Outlook (Oct 18, 2019)

The beautiful green space in the heart of the Wilkes East Neighborhood will be empty after losing its fiscal agent — transforming what was once thought of as the model for future parks in Gresham into just another open area. Despite the work that has been poured into the park, residents will have less of a reason to visit than ever before.

"It almost makes me cry to walk through here and know all those kids won't be coming here to be educated," said Lee Dayfield. "This park was their backyard, playground and forest."

There is no better person to talk to about Nadaka Nature Park than Dayfield. She spearheaded the charge to transform her dream park into a reality. She overcame red tape and bureaucracy, founding Friends of Nadaka to help secure grants and other funding.

The Columbia Slough Watershed Council, a Portland-based organization, had supported the Gresham park since its inception. But with some changes to the board and executive director, the group has decided to focus on other projects.

The backing for Nadaka will end when the money runs dry, which is estimated to happen in January 2020. That means no more activities — from community cleanups to educational gatherings for local schoolchildren — that made the park so special.

"They were so strong and supportive of us for seven years," Dayfield said. "People will notice a big difference."

Click "Read more" (below) to continue reading this article.

Let's Play Futsal! When: Sun, Feb 09, 2020 5PM-7PM Where: Friends of the Children Gym 424 NE 172nd Ave. Get Map!

Indoor Sunday Futsal youth recreation is open to all students in grades 6-12 on Sunday from 5:00-7:00 pm at the Friends of the Children gym.

• Free
• Open to boys and girls in grades 6-12
• Learn new skills, make new friends, play futsal
• Participants must bring a signed waiver to play
• Adult supervision and mentorship provided by Active Children Portland volunteers

For more information, email Ricki Ruiz at Ricardo.Ruiz@GreshamOregon.gov or call 503-583-0771.

Futsal flier and waiver

Read more about Sunday Futsal.