Get Out of Our River

BIG BUSINESS is trying to muscle the city out of its plans to
regulate pollution and environmental damage to the Willamette
River.

City council will hold a town hall discussion on a new regulation
plan for the North Reach of the Willamette on Wednesday, December 16.
The North Reach stretches from the Fremont Bridge to its confluence
with the Columbia River, and is the river’s most polluted stretch. The
city’s new river plan would require companies who want to develop on
the North Reach to go through a city permitting process and pay a fee
toward habitat improvement for wildlife—in addition to existing
federal and state permitting.

Now harsh words are being exchanged between key partners in the
city’s plan—the Audubon Society of Portland, an environmental
group, and the Working Waterfront Coalition (WWC), a group of harbor
business interests including the Port of Portland and Schnitzer
Steel.

“The WWC is trying to gut the plan,” says Bob Sallinger, from the
Audubon Society. “They’re essentially saying that the city should have
no role in regulating the river, that it should be done by federal and
state agencies. But the city has an obligation and a vested interest in
having input and influence over what happens in our river.”

Sallinger says the WWC’s “full-scale assault on the environmental
portion of the plan” is “a grab bag of stock complaints laced with
not-so-subtle threats that industrial property owners will eventually
look to other ports with lower environmental standards if the river
plan is adopted.”

Consultants working for Schnitzer Steel—which had revenues of
$3.6 billion last year—estimated that a new $20 million dock
project would have to pay between $355,000 and $2.85 million more in
permitting fees under the city’s new plan. It would also take an extra
18 months to get the permits approved, according to the
consultants.

The WWC says these delays might discourage development and job
growth along the North Reach, and that no new development would mean
less permitting fees for the city to do environmental work on the North
Reach—a vicious circle.

“We are not trying to gut the plan,” says WWC spokesperson Ann
Gardner—who also works as a lobbyist for Schnitzer Steel. “That
is the opposite of the truth.

“When you look at the increase in time, complexity, and expense,
it’s a show-stopper for business,” Gardner continues. “Are we
threatening? Not at all. But this is an excessive burden. We’re trying
to say this is the reality, and these are the consequences.”

Gardner says the WWC’s members would prefer to pay a fee equivalent
to 1.5 percent of any new construction costs, in exchange for avoiding
the city’s new regulatory approach. Mayor Sam Adams has had several
meetings with the WWC and environmentalists over recent months to try
to smooth over the differences of opinion, but both sides are holding
firm.

“This is Portland, Oregon, and I’m working to both have a successful
working North Reach of the river, but we also have to make more
environmental progress than we have,” says Adams. “I wanted to have
this town hall to air the issue out. There continues to be significant
disagreement but I want the public to know that this conversation is
going on.”