June 25, 1997 Contact Maureen Shine (541) 346-3145 EDITOR'S NOTE: UO planning director Chris Ramey will be unavailable until Tuesday, July 1. For more information regarding this news item, contact Mike Sullivan, city project manager, Eugene Planning and Development Department, (541) 682-5448; Maureen Shine, UO Office of Communications, (541) 346-3145; or the UO Office of Communications, (541) 346-3134. EUGENE--Low-income housing soon will be more plentiful in Eugene, thanks to the University of Oregon's donation of six houses to the City of Eugene. "We're very pleased to donate these buildings to the city for low-income community housing," says Chris Ramey, director of university planning. "These structures will be displaced as a result of campus development projects and we're glad the community can put them to good use." The UO and city signed an intergovernmental agreement this week for the transfer of the properties, located on the east side of campus on or near the construction site for the new UO William O. Knight Law Center at East 15th Avenue and Agate Street. The UO donation includes two structures housing UO offices on Agate Street between East 15th and East 17th avenues, which will be displaced by the new law school project, and four dwellings on Moss and Villard Streets near East 15th Avenue, a site that the city's neighborhood refinement plan sets aside for campus expansion. The six donated houses range in size from two to four bedrooms. "We thought it most cost-effective for the city and beneficial for the community's low-income housing inventory to donate these buildings all at once," said Ramey. "We appreciate the opportunity," says Mike Sullivan, city project manager, Eugene Planning and Development Department. "The city's plan for the houses is to offer them to for-profit and non-profit builders, and public agencies for use as long-term affordable housing." As part of the agreement, the city will remove the four structures on Moss and Villard streets by Aug.1, and the two Agate Street properties by Sept. 1. The city will make the structures available through a request for proposals for low-income housing projects and anticipates the availability of federal funds to loan to the successful bidder for rehabilitation of the structures. Copies of the request for proposals are available at the city's Planning and Development Department, second floor reception area, 99 W. 10th Ave. This is the second such agreement the UO and city have entered into in the last two years. In 1995, the university worked with the city and St. Vincent DePaul to salvage 30 apartments from the former Amazon Family Housing Complex, which were then rehabilitated into low-cost community housing. -30- #O-4101/Local,OrLaw,Special