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Don Metzger, president of the Pointe at Warewood Homeowners Association, gestures toward a portion of a hillside below Rachel Lynn Court, in Roseburg, Friday. Metzger believes that the hillside is unstable.
After heavy rains came down in December 2005, the hillside down below Phyllis Feldkamp's house started sloughing off.
A development below the Pointe at Warewood has been carved out of the rolling oak hills to provide more housing, but the steep slope cuts didn't quite hold.
The developer, Jerry Tabor, fixed the slope problems of last winter and his engineer certified the new slope, but the hill has continued to slough off a bit, and the homeowners up above are worried that the hill that their homes sit on will continue to be undermined.
"We don't want to cause any trouble," Feldkamp said. "We just want to ensure that the slopes are fixed."
The Pointe at Warewood Homeowner's Association has appealed the Roseburg Planning Commission's final approval of the Warewood Terrace development below them.
The City Council will meet Tuesday to determine if Tabor must do further work to protect both the houses above and the houses below from landslides.
"Our foundations are not imperiled up here but our common area could be impacted by slough-offs," said Don Metzger, one of the homeowners.
Community Development Director Fred Alley said Tabor has done everything the city asked of him when the Planning Commission first approved the 27-lot planned-unit development for Warewood Terrace, which is at the north end of Troost Street, above the Garden Valley cinemas.
Most notably, Tabor hired a geotechnical engineer to set guidelines for the development and the engineer, Roy Arnoldt of Bandon, has signed off on the project.
The city has no independent geotechnical engineer of its own.
With flat land largely unavailable inside the city limits, development in the past few years has risen up the hillsides.
Concerns over building safety have been such that the Planning Commission has approved a new Hillside Development Ordinance.
Slides have occurred in several areas of the city besides Warewood, including along Daysha Drive, off Kline Street, and downhill from Granite Ridge Drive in the Rocky Ridge subdivision.
If the city council passes that ordinance, 26 pages of building codes will replace the half-page now on the books.
Representatives for Tabor declined to comment for this article, but in a letter from Arnoldt to Tabor dated Dec. 11 that The News-Review retrieved from the city of Roseburg, Arnoldt affirms the project's quality:
"Because of the variability of the exposed bedrock found within this development I believe the general cut slope design being used to be reasonable. Due to some scattered weathering spots, several small additional adjustments were included within this slope construction. These zones may show slight ravel for several years after the completion of the construction but should not endanger upslope development."
The homeowners, unsatisfied with the developer's work to maintain their hillside, hired their own geotechnical engineer and got a very different report.
Engineer William Galli wrote in his report that while the homes above are not in danger, the hillsides will continue to erode and could pose a threat to the yards and homes below the slope cut.
"These cut slopes have removed lateral support to the upslope lots and are beginning to fail up to and across the property boundary. It appears the City is prepared to approve the Final Plat even with such knowledge of unstable areas. Failures in the future will almost assuredly lead to lawsuits into which all parties, including the City could be drawn," Galli wrote.
Metzger and Feldkamp both insisted that Tabor has the right to develop his property as he sees fit, but more work needs to be done to protect the hillsides.
"All we are interested in are those slopes adjoining the Pointe," Feldkamp said.
"Our whole request in the appeal is that the city do the post-construction review before it starts raining and building begins," Metzger said.
* You can reach reporter Chris Gray at 957-4218 or by e-mail at cgray@newsreview.info.
<i>Editor's note: This story has been updated from an earlier version which contained a mistake.</i>
A development below the Pointe at Warewood has been carved out of the rolling oak hills to provide more housing, but the steep slope cuts didn't quite hold.
The developer, Jerry Tabor, fixed the slope problems of last winter and his engineer certified the new slope, but the hill has continued to slough off a bit, and the homeowners up above are worried that the hill that their homes sit on will continue to be undermined.
"We don't want to cause any trouble," Feldkamp said. "We just want to ensure that the slopes are fixed."
The Pointe at Warewood Homeowner's Association has appealed the Roseburg Planning Commission's final approval of the Warewood Terrace development below them.
The City Council will meet Tuesday to determine if Tabor must do further work to protect both the houses above and the houses below from landslides.
"Our foundations are not imperiled up here but our common area could be impacted by slough-offs," said Don Metzger, one of the homeowners.
Community Development Director Fred Alley said Tabor has done everything the city asked of him when the Planning Commission first approved the 27-lot planned-unit development for Warewood Terrace, which is at the north end of Troost Street, above the Garden Valley cinemas.
Most notably, Tabor hired a geotechnical engineer to set guidelines for the development and the engineer, Roy Arnoldt of Bandon, has signed off on the project.
The city has no independent geotechnical engineer of its own.
With flat land largely unavailable inside the city limits, development in the past few years has risen up the hillsides.
Concerns over building safety have been such that the Planning Commission has approved a new Hillside Development Ordinance.
Slides have occurred in several areas of the city besides Warewood, including along Daysha Drive, off Kline Street, and downhill from Granite Ridge Drive in the Rocky Ridge subdivision.
If the city council passes that ordinance, 26 pages of building codes will replace the half-page now on the books.
Representatives for Tabor declined to comment for this article, but in a letter from Arnoldt to Tabor dated Dec. 11 that The News-Review retrieved from the city of Roseburg, Arnoldt affirms the project's quality:
"Because of the variability of the exposed bedrock found within this development I believe the general cut slope design being used to be reasonable. Due to some scattered weathering spots, several small additional adjustments were included within this slope construction. These zones may show slight ravel for several years after the completion of the construction but should not endanger upslope development."
The homeowners, unsatisfied with the developer's work to maintain their hillside, hired their own geotechnical engineer and got a very different report.
Engineer William Galli wrote in his report that while the homes above are not in danger, the hillsides will continue to erode and could pose a threat to the yards and homes below the slope cut.
"These cut slopes have removed lateral support to the upslope lots and are beginning to fail up to and across the property boundary. It appears the City is prepared to approve the Final Plat even with such knowledge of unstable areas. Failures in the future will almost assuredly lead to lawsuits into which all parties, including the City could be drawn," Galli wrote.
Metzger and Feldkamp both insisted that Tabor has the right to develop his property as he sees fit, but more work needs to be done to protect the hillsides.
"All we are interested in are those slopes adjoining the Pointe," Feldkamp said.
"Our whole request in the appeal is that the city do the post-construction review before it starts raining and building begins," Metzger said.
* You can reach reporter Chris Gray at 957-4218 or by e-mail at cgray@newsreview.info.
<i>Editor's note: This story has been updated from an earlier version which contained a mistake.</i>
