News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
The City of Sisters and the owners of the 30-acre McKenzie Meadows property are close to a deal to annex the land into the city.
City staff was expecting to have a draft of an annexation agreement in hand from the city's attorney last Monday.
The property, which lies on the west edge of Sisters directly north of Sisters Middle School, is proposed to be the future site of a "senior housing community." It is owned by Bill Willitts, Curt Kallberg and the Reed family, all of Sisters.
Voters agreed in 2006 that the property should be annexed.
The developer of the senior living community, Pinnacle Alliance Group, LLC, of Yakima, Washington, reports that it has received 66 letters of interest from Sisters Country seniors. Plans currently call for 42 units in the first phase of the facility, with two additional phases planned, for an eventual total of 80 units.
In addition, developers propose a separate development of single-family dwellings, geared toward people aged 50 and older. Residents of that development would have access to the amenities of the senior living facility, ranging from meals to laundry to landscaping and medical services.
"Zoe and I are potentially planning to move to a lot out there," said Willitts. "They're going to be larger units (than those in the senior facility), i.e. 900 to 1,200 square feet."
Willitts said that 1.5 acres will be set aside for a potential medical center, which would serve the broader population of the Sisters Country, not just the residents of the development.
Nine acres out of the 30-acre property will be left as open space. Willitts said there will be four park amenities in the space, including a walking path. Potential residents will be surveyed as to what they want for the amenities. The city would have the option of adopting the space as a city park, Willitts said.
While the council is close to approving an agreement, not everyone is sold on the idea.
"We just don't need the property brought in," said Councilor Sharlene Weed. "We have an over 25-year inventory of land in the city right now."
She believes the senior facility should have been accommodated on other property already in the city limits.
However, Mark Adolf of Pinnacle Alliance Group has said repeatedly that the price offering on the McKenzie Meadows property made the project feasible.
"They made him such an attractive offer on the land that it made this pencil," said Mayor Lon Kellstrom. "Otherwise, he couldn't have done it, we're told."
City Manager Eileen Stein said that she is aware that Adolf looked at other properties, including a parcel on the side of Highway 242, which would have been a highly suitable location. Adolf reportedly could not come to an agreement on a price.
'"He did his own due diligence and he came back and said, 'this is where I want to go,'" Stein said.
The annexation process has been long and complicated, and there are other significant steps yet to be taken. Stein said she doesn't think Adolf necessarily recognized what it would take to site the facility at McKenzie Meadows.
"I'm sure it's taken longer to work out than he thought, but here we are," Stein said.
That long process has taken a lot of staff time and Weed is not pleased that the city has decided not to assess more charges on the developers beyond the initial $3,500 they paid for the annexation process.
She thinks the developers should pay for the additional staff time, another $3,000 or so, and counting.
"Always in the past, that's the mantra: development pays for itself," she said.
But Kellstrom noted that annexation is a legislative process, not a land use process, and there is no fee schedule. Also, he said, both parties bear responsibility for the lengthy process, as developers' plans shift and the city puts in and takes things out of the agreement. Annexation discussions on McKenzie Meadows actually long predate Pinnacle's proposed development.
"We haven't done it in the past in terms of annexation of property," Stein said of the idea of assessing extra charges. "Nor have we had such an extensive, multiyear annexation process as we've had with this property."
"Our thinking is, that's why the city is here," Kellstrom said, noting that the city will receive financial recompensation in the end. "We're going to bring (McKenzie Meadows) in and they are going to start paying city taxes. And for that reason we don't think we need to do that."
Weed also argues that there are not enough teeth in the annexation agreement to ensure that the developers actually come across with what they promise.
"The agreement that's been created is basically a giveaway to the developers," Weed said. "I've never seen anything like it in the past. There's no timeline for the assisted-living facility; there's no guarantee that it will ever be built. Let's put a timeline in. Say, yeah, it'll be built before any single-family houses."
Weed also believes that "the developers may be open to some of the things the council's not asking for."
Kellstrom argues that putting too much in an annexation agreement is part of the reason the process has dragged on for years. He notes that there is an entire land-use process yet to come where detailed issues can be discussed.
Weed, for her part, believes the city should ask what it wants to ask when it has a negotiating position - in the annexation process.
Despite divisions on the council, the process seems to be nearing its end. The council is expected to take the matter up in a workshop on Thursday, October 15, and may be prepared to vote on a final agreement later this month.
For more information on the project contact Community Liaison Keith Sampson at 549-0903 or 610-6836 or via e-mail at [email protected]
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
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