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Phoenix council considers interchange By ROBERT PLAIN,for the Mail Tribune Mar 22, 2005 12:00 AM A A The Phoenix City Council agreed Monday night to partially finance the construction of an interchange connecting Fern Valley Road to Interstate 5. Because the Oregon Department of Transportation has threatened to appeal a zone change, this local match for the transportation improvement project is seen as necessary in order to locate a Home Depot store in Phoenix. The council voted 5 to — to help pay for the project. Steven Schulman cast the dissenting vote. Even though the city could end up paying more than & 36;2 million to build the interchange, council members were confident they could recoup this expense through future systems-development charges. The city will create a transportation system development charge for the interchange so future developers who benefit from it will help defray the cost. — If all of these properties developed in a reasonably short amount of time, they would generate the two and a half million dollars we would need, Murray said. Murray said the city and ODOT have not yet agreed on how the money would be paid in the first place. All ODOT is looking for at this point is a strategy, he said. Home Depot, as well as other government funding sources, have not agreed to pay their share of the interchange cost. The metropolitan planning organization has been asked to contribute & 36;1 million and Home Depot has been asked to contribute & 36;1.3 million. The MPO will meet in April to vote on allocating this money and Phoenix Mayor Vicki Bear said Home Depot will have a decision by Wednesday or Thursday. On Friday, Brian Cannard, the real estate manager for Home Depot, said he was not certain if the company could make those numbers work for them. Council members and Murray were largely in agreement that this could be the city's best opportunity for fixing the Fern Valley Interchange. We don't have a lot of options for funding the interchange, Murray said. If we don't get this done, it might go away for a long time. However, Schulman felt that spending & 36;2 million was a lot to ask of a city that has no money to draw from. I'm concerned about all this mythical money we are spending, he said. I guess I missed the meeting when the magic money tree was shown to the other councilors. To which Council President Carlos DeBritto replied, It's not money we have to put up front. Once the interchange goes in, this is going to trigger all sorts of things. Bear agreed. She said, At some point you need to put a little money out in order to get a little money back.