Planning Department items:

20-032 DCA code changes associated with House Bill 2001 related to duplexes and ADUs: Planning staff held a PC work session regarding HB 2001 on October 26 and the PC hearing is scheduled for the January PC meeting.

Hood Street Daycare (20-039 DCA/ADJ):  Completeness check has been completed.  This request to construct a new day care facility at 38422 Hood Street is currently under review.

Tree removal at 38432 Maple Street (20-036 TREE):  This tree removal request at 38432 Maple Street and request to install a retaining wall and grade near retention trees has now been deemed complete and final order has been issued.

Sandy Woods II (20-034 ZC):  This zoning map update with FSH overlay for Sandy Woods II has been withdrawn by the applicant.

Rogue Fabrication zone change (20-041 ZC):  This request to change zoning designation from I-1 to I-2 for Rogue Fabrication’s new facility at the corner of Champion Way and Industrial Way has been deemed incomplete.  Staff sent an incompleteness letter to applicant and are awaiting a few additional materials.

Vista Loop Lot Line Adjustment (20-031):  Staff received the requested updated plat map from the applicant.  Final order has been issued.

Downtown Walkability Assessment:  Development Svcs intern Christina Winberry completed the analytic work for this project prior to departing the City.  Shelley Denison is reviewing her work and performing some final editing before bringing this to City Council.

Pleasant Street Master Plan (18-022 CPA):  Staff is now revisiting this project and re-evaluating what is left to complete as the overall workload in Planning seems to be diminishing.

Bull Run Terrace (19-050 CPA/ZC/SUB):  This project was recommended for approval by the Planning Commission at their October 26th meeting, and will be heard at the City Council meeting on November 30th.

18350 Ross Ave Accessory Structure Setback Adjustment (20-044 ADJ):  This project is currently under review.

Tree removal request at Alpine Village Apartments (20-045 TREE):  Final order for this tree removal request was issued on October 30^th.

OAOR Annexation (20-025):  Staff asked for a continuance for this project at the last Planning Commission meeting due to a couple of fairly serious code violations with Clackamas County.  Staff met with the applicant in mid-October – it was determined that the applicant needs to correct these code County violations prior to moving forward.  This project will be brought back before the PC once the outstanding issues have been corrected.  Staff anticipates that this will probably be in the 2^nd half of 2021.

The Views Planned Development (20-028):  This project will be heard by the Planning Commission at their November 23^rd meeting. 

Sandy High School Field House (20-040 DR/VAR): This proposal to construct new indoor batting cages at 36525 Industrial Way was deemed complete on November 12.  The proposal will include variations that necessitate a Planning Commission hearing.

16320 Bluff Road (20-037 DR):  The final order for this request to construct a new single family residence on Bluff Rd was issued on October 23^rd.

Building Department items:

FALL 2020 Building Department Report

The SPRING and SUMMER OF 2020 passed too quickly.   Despite the pandemic and uncertainties of politics and the unstable financial markets, residential construction and the building industry is still going strong.   The monthly reports produced by Noryne Robinson of Sandy’s permit activity are evidence.  

Drivers passing the new Space Age Fuel station see that Sandy is definitely growing.  The month of October saw more underground utility work and more foundations.  The contractors recently passed the rough framing, mechanical, plumbing and electrical inspections in the main building, installed weather protection, and have insulated the interior.  Enormous footings for the steel canopy over the fueling area were poured in September, but the underground fuel piping has been delayed due to backordered components.  

Anyone driving through our new residential developments on the north and south sides of Sandy can see that new home construction remains steady.   Sandy issued 11 permits for new single family homes in October alone.  Residential home sales have continued to expand as more people continue to leave the Portland area, and the mortgage rates continue to drop.  Home prices have continued to climb with the housing demand.  This has spurred more home remodeling and flipping of homes.  Consequently, this increase in home values has spawned numerous unpermitted remodeling projects by homeowners and unlicensed contractors.  Code enforcement is stretched and unable to prevent the current boom of illegal remodeling.  Neither are we able to prevent the growing number of secretive home conversions from single family homes into multi-dwelling residences and boarding houses.  The uniformed owners and occupants are not aware that permits and inspections help ensure minimum fire/life/safety measures, and ultimately save property and lives.  

The problem is growing, and much too large to adequately cover in this report, so it will have to wait until the next Building Department Report.

Respectfully submitted by
Terrence Gift, Building Official

Kelly’s Kudos:

I want to thank all our City Council candidates for running a competitive campaign that really highlighted our shared interest in making Sandy the best place possible.  I want to congratulate Don, Kathleen, and Rich on their elections.  Furthermore, I want to thank Councilor Lee for being such a compassionate and amazing City Councilor.  Her commitment to Sandy on issues such as sustainability, affordable housing, childcare, social equality, and public health are very much appreciated. I wish Councilor Lee all the best! 

Internal projects: 

• Minor changes to Community Center:
  • Lighting: Complete
  • Garbage enclosures:  Complete
  • West entrance awning:  Design and construction are complete.  We have been waiting for the design work for the porte cochere to be completed prior to installation – we would prefer to match the stain color and type to that being proposed for the porte cochere for consistency.  Since the design work is taking a bit longer than anticipated, we are going to choose the stain color for the architect shortly so we can proceed with installation of this awning. 
  • West entrance – new metal door:  Reviewing potential replacement doors now.

Economic Development items:

Econ Devl – Commercial Properties (vacancies, new businesses, etc.):

• Façade project – Mtn Moka Building:  Brad Picking has applied for a Façade program grant for a refresh of this building.  Scope of work for the project includes stone wrapping and a new look  for the overhand support posts at the suite entrances, new exterior lighting for the mural to be painted on the back side of the building, new Hardi siding for the physical therapy office, a refresh of the garbage enclosure area and a new 3-tone paint job for the entire building.  At the time of this writing, the siding, painting and stone work had already been completed.
• Façade project – Old Church on Pioneer Blvd:  The little church on Pioneer Boulevard is getting a new look!  Building owner Alan Fleischman reached out to the Ec Dev Office in the spring and inquired about assistance.  He told us he was going to replace the siding and most of the windows in the building before giving it a new paint job, and we jumped at the chance to help out.  Some of the siding at the ground level of the building will change style, but the majority of it including the steeple will be replaced with the exact same style.  Buildings in that particular section of downtown have a specific historical exemption to Sandy Style rules that allows them to remain white, and Mr. Fleischman chose to take advantage of this exemption.

Econ Devl – Internal Projects:

Downtown maintenance:

• AntFarm downtown maintenance crew:  All October maintenance work is now completed.  [The two pics below are of the landscaping strip next to DQ on Proctor and the landscape strip across from Two Bros at the coin-op car wash – both strips were overrun with weeds and had become eyesores – you can see the “before” look on the first picture at the bottom where the property line is.]
  

Holiday street tree lighting:  Installation will be completed by November 16.  We accepted a slight (3%) increase in cost to cover their increased labor costs for this work.  Installation to occur literally any day now.

Econ Devl – Economic Development Committee:

The November meeting of the Economic Development Committee was held virtually on November  4^th.  It began with a quick presentation in the Updates section highlighting the current work on two Façade Improvement projects going on downtown – the refresh projects going on at the Mountain Moka Building and the Old Church.  

Our invited guest took up the bulk of the meeting.  Andie Edmonds of NAI Cascade gave our committee a close up look at the Skipper property at the 362^nd/Bell St. extension and talked to us about general development concepts and how NAI Cascade and the property owner are viewing the development prospects of their property.   She concluded the meeting by asking our group to consider what the City and it’s residents would like to see built there (if anything specific) and how the City might direct that development by considering targeted incentives toward specific development concepts.  Although retail (including big box stores) would have the most interest in this space, she also let us know that the property owners are civic-minded folks and are open to suggestions.

Econ Devl – Conferences/training:

In October I attended the 2020 OEDA (the Oregon Economic Development Association) Conference from October 26-28 and Travel Oregon’s Outdoor Recreation Summit during the first half of October (Zoom meeting series).  Both events were virtual and focused most of their programming on economic recovery and ongoing management of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

For a city of 12,000 citizens, Sandy has really hit the mark here with the following actions:

• Sandy’s Emergency Small Business Assistance program providing badly needed financial relief to local business – for a city our size, this was quite an accomplishment.  Staff is looking forward to continuing this effort on behalf of Council with Round 2 of the ESBA coming in December.
• Streamlining our rules regarding allowing outdoor seating in off-street parking spaces and erecting temporary accessory structures for outdoor seating, making it easier for restaurants to accommodate the outdoor dining needed during this pandemic.

Eliminating off-street parking requirements in the C-1 district, eliminating a barrier to development in our downtown commercial district.