The Estacada Urban Renewal Agency voted to accept a proposed study boundary for a potential new urban renewal area and directed staff to form a technical advisory committee and begin public outreach.

Consultant John Legarza told the agency that the subcommittee reviewed two initial options and recommended a third, “Option C,” which expands study area coverage to the former mill site and the waterfront and considers a future Oregon Department of Transportation area. "Option C is what is in front of you that the subcommittee recommends that we move forward with the study," Legarza said.

The nut graf: adopting a study boundary does not create an urban renewal plan or authorize spending; it sets the geographic area for technical analysis, tax-increment modeling and community engagement. If the agency proceeds later, those analyses would inform program recommendations and any eventual formal urban renewal plan adoption.

Agency members discussed the scope of the boundary and asked that certain downtown businesses be included. Aboard member who asked to expand the area said local merchants on Upper Main Street and Sixth Avenue were left out of a prior boundary and requested they be considered this time. City Manager Kirk (name provided in the meeting) and Legarza said staff would map the specific blocks and return with acreage and assessed-value figures. Legarza said staff typically expect to refine the draft boundary and bring updates to the board “probably every other month” during the study period.

The board instructed staff to set up a technical advisory committee composed of council members, commission representatives, fire-district staff and business stakeholders, and to hold public open houses in September and October to solicit ideas about projects and programs, including recruitment of grocery or retail uses and infrastructure needed to connect the mill site plateau to downtown and to Lake Estacada. Legarza described infrastructure investment — public water, sewer and streets — as typical funding uses to support redevelopment under urban renewal.

A motion to accept the proposed report for the new URA boundary and to authorize staff to establish a technical advisory committee and begin community outreach passed on a roll call vote.

Board members and staff emphasized this is an early-stage, study-only step: the motion authorizes technical work and outreach, and any changes based on public feedback would be returned to the board for further direction or formal plan adoption.