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<br /> • Land -use planner Steve Gordon (right) and businessman Chuck Missal
<br /> found common ground in the wetlands of Eugene, Oregon.
<br /> (EPA). And, perhaps best of all, it has become a model for "'Wetlands ?!,' 1 said. I had been a member of The
<br /> other communities facing wetlands challenges. Nature Conservancy for 25 years and i thought 1 knew
<br /> "We ended up with government, environmentalists, what wetlands were. You know, a tidal slough. But 1 was
<br /> landowners and businesses all supporting the plan," says naive."
<br /> Robert Moulton, an attorney who represents a number of Not only did federal wetland regulators deny the per -
<br /> wetlands property owners and a member of the Eugene mit, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said that Spectra
<br /> Chamber of Commerce, "and it's because we were all Physics had filled the first 20 acres without authorization.
<br /> brought into the educational process." Says Missar: "We had jumped through all the hoops.
<br /> We weren't trying to slime anybody. It's just that nobody
<br /> THE WETLANDS ISSUE in Eugene first came to a head at locally was aware of the federal land -use planning require -
<br /> Spectra Physics, a bar -code scanner manufacturer that, ment. The process wasn't in place and there was no prece-
<br /> with 500 employees, is one of the largest firms in the city. dent."
<br /> The company cane to West Eugene in 1980, con- Missar, a string -bean guy with an easy, warns smile,
<br /> structing a one -story wood building on 12 oI 32 acres it continues: "At that point we could fight and make some
<br /> had purchased. Five years later the firm filled another lawyers rich, or we could say, 'OK, we don't agree, but
<br /> eight acres and added a two -story manufacturing unit. we'll try to resolve the issues.'"
<br /> In late 1987 Spectra Physics applied for a permit to fill The EPA agreed to hold Spectra Physics' fill permit
<br /> its remaining.creage and erect a third building. Facility application until the company "mitigated " — bought
<br /> manager Chuck Missar remembers: "A city official called additional acreage in the same Amazon Creek watershed
<br /> and said, 'Chuck, 1 need to talk to you.' That's always a and did whatever was necessary to make it a functioning
<br /> bad -news phrase. He told me wetlands had been discov- wetland.
<br /> ered on our property in an environmental assessment. Over several years, Spectra Physics rehabilitated about
<br /> SI:I'ILAMIII: h /0(: 199 - NATURE CONSERVANCY 11
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