City of Sherwood planning staff presented details and recommended findings related to a conditional-use permit for Bearcat Brewing Company during a July 17 hearing; the record in the provided transcript ends with staff explanation of proposed changes to easement-related conditions and does not show a final hearings-officer decision.

Staff said the subject property at 20345 Southwest Pacific Highway is zoned light industrial and measures roughly 6.37 acres. The application seeks to establish a restaurant/tavern/lounge use without drive-through service in an existing tenant space of about 2,481 square feet, while the remainder of the building would continue to accommodate manufacturing and related industrial activities, which are permitted outright in the zone.

Staff summarized site history and infrastructure: the building was constructed in 1992 and has seen phased development (SP 92-06; SP 95-03). Plan Amendment 97-9 altered how commercial uses were treated in industrial zones; staff said this proposed restaurant use was not an established, preexisting retail/commercial use and therefore is evaluated under the conditional-use criteria for restaurants/taverns.

A traffic memo prepared by Mackenzie and dated May 13, 2025, estimated an increase of about 95 average daily trips and roughly 11 PM-peak-hour trips compared with the prior use. Staff said the property fronts Pacific Highway, where sidewalks and other improvements have been installed following recent ODOT projects, and that the site has existing stormwater quality management, an on-site public sanitary sewer connection and domestic and fire service from a water line in Pacific Highway. Staff also said overhead utilities along the property exceed the voltage threshold that typically triggers undergrounding requirements but concluded the cost/scale of the proposal did not make undergrounding proportional at this time; PG&E was notified and had opportunity to comment.

After publication of the July 10 staff report, staff conducted an internal review focused on nexus and proportionality for required easements and other conditions tied to modern development standards. Staff recommended removing certain historic easement-related language from the findings and eliminating related conditions that had been included in the draft staff report—specifically, staff discussed proposed removals tied to chapters referenced as 16.1.1.2 (water supply), 16.1.1.4 (stormwater) and 16.1.1.8 (public and private utilities). Staff said that removal of that language resulted in the proposed deletion of conditions labeled in the draft findings as C3 and A10 (water/supply/easement related) and the removal of condition C4 (stormwater easement language).

Why this matters: The staff recommendations would allow a limited restaurant/brewpub-style use to operate within an industrial tenant space while keeping the property’s industrial character for the larger portion of the building. The easement and undergrounding determinations affect the property-owner’s obligations for recorded easements and construction-related improvements if the use proceeds.

Discussion (recorded at hearing): City staff presented the technical review, trip-generation memo and the proposed edits to findings and conditions; no applicant testimony appears in the provided excerpt, and the hearings officer’s decision on this item does not appear in the supplied transcript segment.

Next steps: The hearings officer will either adopt staff findings and conditions, modify them, or deny the application; the transcript excerpt does not show which option was chosen. Any final decision would be memorialized in a written order and would be subject to appeal to the planning commission.