Success through community involvement
Zoned heavy industrial, the former Chiloquin Forest Products Mill sits on 28 acres in a premier location in a small Oregon town. In fact, the Klamath County government, which foreclosed on the land in 1998, probably saw it as an opportunity to lure new business to town, says Chuck Wells, a member of the Central Klamath County Community Action Team.
However, the Chiloquin community has other plans for the site. People have spoken up, wanting to see the property used for a variety of purposes. And they don’t all focus on economic development.
The nearby Klamath Tribes would like a corner of the property on the banks of the Sprague River, once sacred fishing grounds, to be returned to the tribes. The tribes have proposed building a wellness center there. The local school district would like a small portion to be used for a softball diamond. The city of Chiloquin also has a request: It needs a few acres for a city settling pond.
Those requests still leave room for something that would benefit the entire community, such as walking and biking paths that lead into town, and even some residential or small business developments, Wells says. That piece of property could go a long way for the people of Chiloquin.
“It could become a more vibrant part of the community,” he says.
It’s important that communities be active in the redevelopment of brownfield sites, says Katie Robertson, cleanup project manager with the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (ODEQ). Garnering community support can bring much success to a project, she says.
The Chiloquin mill is a great example of how a community can jump aboard a brownfield project and influence the outcome. The Chiloquin site has used various techniques, from numerous public meetings to a Web site devoted to keeping the public informed, to raise community support.
“It has been a better project because of their involvement,” Robertson says.
Having an informed community also is a way to preempt problems that may arise. For example, the project called for the Oregon Department of Transportation to bring in 30,000 cubic yards of fill to the site, which is bordered by the town’s two schools. That’s a lot of trucks in and out of a school zone. The community was kept informed of the truck traffic and children’s safety was at the top of the priority list for ODEQ.
By keeping the community in the project’s loop, ODEQ has also been able to forge good relationships with the city and school district in Chiloquin and has maintained an open dialogue with the tribes, Robertson says. That’s important in any community, but especially in a smaller one. “In a rural community, you have a lot of people watching what you’re doing,” she says.
Lani Hickey, natural resources manager for Klamath County agrees. “They like to be kept informed,” Hickey says of the public. “And if they don’t know what’s going on, then you have problems.”
Among the tools used to gain community support were public meetings as well as planning charrettes. A charrette is a French word meaning “cart.” In the business world, a charrette refers to an intense work session, usually with workshops and open houses, that harnesses the talents and energies of all parties and results in a feasible plan for a project.
Usually, anyone with a stock in a property is invited to the charrette. That may include the property owner, state and federal officials, community associations, real estate agents and bankers, city representatives and residents. In the meeting, all those involved talk about the different ways to develop the property.
In Chiloquin, two charrettes were held. While the first focused on what was to become of the site once cleaned up, the second focused on the project’s financing. The Governor’s Economic Revitalization Team, which consists of representatives from several key state agencies, attended this second charrette.
Wells recognizes it can be difficult getting a community involved in these meetings. That’s why it’s important that officials do their best to get the word out about them. That also means making sure meeting times and dates are convenient for community members.
In an effort to keep the community abreast of the latest news from the project, technical documents are also available at the local library and online at http://www.deq.state.or.us/wmc/cu/sites/chiloquinmill.htm. The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (ODEQ) even created a community-focused Web site for this project.
It would have been easy for the county government to decide on its own what was to become of the Chiloquin mill site; however, this is an issue of land-use planning, which the public should be involved in, Wells says.
And the public’s participation has been a much-encouraged thing. “I don’t think (the project) ever would have worked without the community involved,” Hickey says.
