General notes: The final First Friday of the season went off with only one minor hitch, and it seems that it was once again fairly well attended. The minor hitch was that the Chamber, in moving the petting zoo to the field on the Leathers lot, found out that FFA does not carry insurance for those sorts of events and that the person managing the Leathers family properties requires insurance for any event on their property. This makes sense, considering that farm animals do bite and/or charge from time to time and this should be planned for. The SACC tried to purchase coverage for the event at the last minute, but as soon as our insurer found out that live animals were involved he said they would not insure us – full stop. Apparently events with live animals are absolutely toxic to insurers.
Strangely, FFA does not carry insurance, and we did not find out about this until 24 hours before the event, making it impossible to move the petting zoo to another location even if we had one. Now that we know, we will make different arrangements for next year regarding that one sub-event, but it was a disappointment as this was very popular last year. Many FF goers made it known that they were unhappy about this development.
Other than that, the Library said they did pretty well, and so did the usual suspects (Lori Ryland, Beer Den, Dita’s, AntFarm). Trick or Treat Trail is coming up next on the 24th of October, and Khrys and Jennifer are working diligently on that event already. Flyers have been sent out and are available at City Hall and other locations around the City, but this event should be the same as in year’s past. It will be exciting to see how many kids come out for this one.
* – One more thing regarding the TTT: last year I had a couple of business owners (who shall remain nameless) complain that they were seeing kids coming to their stores from outside of Sandy, and that they didn’t want to be paying for and distributing candy to kids who weren’t “local”. I have instructed everyone over at the Chamber to respond to any complaints like this with the following “script”:
“Please remember that the Trick or Treat Trail is a business awareness event, meaning that the purpose of this event is to show people that there are retail businesses they can shop at in downtown Sandy. You should be delighted that people from outside of the community are taking the time to walk around our downtown business district and familiarize themselves with the stores here. If they came back next week and wanted to buy something from you, would you refuse them service because they were from Gresham or Portland or Vancouver? Of course not.
…And if cost is your concern, consider this — you’re going to meet a lot of potential new customers at TTT, and all it’s going to cost you to get them in your door is a $0.10 piece of candy. In the promotional marketing world, it doesn’t get any cheaper than that.”
Commercial Properties (vacancies, new businesses, etc.):
TCBY: This business has indeed closed. After contacting the property management/commercial realty company that manages this complex, they did confirm that the owners have closed the business for good, although no reason was given. This property is back on the market, although I’m not really sure how they plan on finding a lessee when they’re asking $2.80/SF/month in combined rent and common area maintenance with a 5-year minimum lease. That rate makes the two properties available in this complex the most expensive commercial properties for lease in Sandy, with the next most expensive property not even being in the same ballpark. For comparative purposes, the two vacant properties between Sparky’s and the UPS Store are being offered for $1/SF/month with a 1 year minimum lease.
With rates like that, I have a feeling that these properties are going to be vacant for a very, very long time. I would love to be wrong about that. Time will tell.
NW Trading Post: This is now a done deal, and no back up plans were needed. This building (the one with the new carpet shop in it) has completed renovations and passed final inspection, and Mr. Booth intends to move his pawn shop into the east side of the building it before the end of October. Noryne and I have had many conversations with this business owner, and I am actually excited to see how he sets up his new shop. If his other two stores are any indication, this will be a nicely stocked compliment to the second hand stores in Sandy and will give us yet another successful retailer in the downtown area.
B of A building: Nothing new here, but negotiations are still ongoing regarding the transfer of this property to another local business owner. Buyer still sounds optimistic that something will get done here shortly. Stay tuned… [LAST MINUTE UPDATE: just spoke to staff of the potential buyer, and have been told that a tentative agreement has been reached and that the contract is now “at the bank being processed”. I will confirm, but if true, this is a done deal and I will be revealing the identity of the new owner shortly]
35900 Industrial Way Suite 305: The business leasing this property has finally shown up. The sign above the door states that the property is occupied by NW Elite Crete, which is listed as the “Northwest distributor, trainer & technical support for Elite Crete Systems, Inc. line of decorative concrete overlay system: basic resurfacing, acid staining, antiquing, stamped overlays, MicroFinishing, MMA Sealer, Epoxies & Urethanes”. The gentleman operating this business states that his current business model is to provide installation and finishing instruction for installing concrete floors. He appears to have moved to Sandy from Troutdale.
Strangely enough, there is another business (personal friends of the owner of Northwest Elite Crete) that is also claiming this as their business address, and it appears that for the time being they are going to share the space. The other business is a knife manufacturing company, and the couple that owns it seems nice enough. Of course, neither company had picked up a business application, and the primary business owner has already installed a wall sign without a permit (of course!) However, to my untrained eye at least, the sign looks like it complies with city code, and both business owners happily agreed to fill out their license and permit applications quickly and get them in to Noryne. I will follow up on this shortly… [UPDATE: it appears that the knife company has turned in their business license application – LaClaire’s Cutlery Shoppe’s fire/life safety inspection will take place on 10/6]
Oregon’s Wild Harvest building: …..has a new commercial broker representing it – Colm Commercial Retail Services out of Bend. Pam Martin has contacted me recently to state that she is now willing to sell the property in addition to offering it for lease. She has been talking to Planning about possibly using UR money for a minor façade improvement to help market the building if this would be an acceptable use of that money. I don’t know all the details of that discussion, but I do know that Tracy is talking to her and that it sounds like a promising conversation.
Benson property: That rascal Mark Benson is at it again. Remember the “Free Land for Brewpub” sign during the Lazenby days? Well, it’s up again and asks for inquiries to be directed to an email address or at AM/PM. I also received a call from our illustrious Hawaiian car dealer letting me know the deal is being advertised again, but he was fairly imprecise about what the actual “deal” involves. I have an email request in with him to clarify, so as soon as I know more you will to.
76 Station on Proctor: This organization apparently closed for business over the weekend. I can’t really say I am surprised by this development, as I very rarely saw anybody stop for gas there. Their prices were always a good bit higher than the Arco station across the street, they were farther down Proctor and they didn’t really do anything to make their store stand out. I did take the time to pop into this store a few times over the summer to check them out, and the employees of this store were about as friendly as French policemen (not a compliment). Plus (and I don’t really have any hard data to back this up, but…) common sense would seem to indicate that playing loud gangsta rap in your convenience store probably appeals to a very, very, very small customer demographic and would alienate most everyone else. Probably not the best business decision on their part.
Carlson property (old La Torta site): I ran into our friend Jerry as I was out and about a couple of days ago, and here’s the latest: he is indeed planning on setting up the property with utilities for use with a food cart pod, and has been advertising for food carts along those lines. He will have space for around 10 carts, and claims to be getting a good amount of interest in this concept from food cart operators. He is actually working well with Tracy right now to get things set up, and his “dispute” about parking issues sounds minor and not something he seems to be overly concerned with.
He wants to call it “Sandlandia”. [heavy sigh] If the food is good enough, I might forgive him for that sometime in the distant future.
Project work: Work continues on the “City of Sandy Omnibus Bicycle Tourism Proposal” tourism development grant from Clackamas County Tourism & Cultural Affairs. I am currently working on putting together a budget for the project, and will complete the application for the grant no later than October 14th for submittal.
Conferences/training:
- Oregon Economic Development Association annual conference (Medford) October 18-20.
- Emerging Local Government Leaders annual conference (Edgefield) October 22, 23