WHEN SUMMER HITS in Portland, aspiring mariners set a course for Swan Island.
The North Portland industrial enclave, an island in name only these days, hosts one of the few public boat launches within city limits. That launch and an accompanying dock quickly fill to capacity when the weather turns balmy.
So the city wants to spruce the thing up. As part of a freshly approved deal [PDF] between the Portland Bureau of Environmental Services and Portland Parks and Recreation (PP&R), the parks bureau is going to take ownership of the run-down launch, pouring an estimated $600,000 into making repairs and bolstering security.
It's a project the cash-strapped parks bureau might balk at in other instances. But in this case, it plans to pay for the fixes from a special pot of cash. It told Portland City Council the money would come from "system development charge" (SDC) funds—fees the bureau collects from new development citywide, designed to help ensure it can expand the parks system in a fast-growing city.
The only problem? It's not clear the dock project qualifies for use of that money.