Officials seek to save prized city post office

The U.S. Postal Service, the city of Eugene and the State Historic Preservation Office are trying to hammer out an agreement to make sure artistic and prized features of the landmark post office building at Fifth Avenue and Willamette Street are maintained when the Postal Service sells the building.

But no one wants to be the legally responsible party that would make sure any new owner of the 71-year-old building obeyed such a covenant.

At stake are such elements of the building as its two Depression-era murals painted by Portland artist Carl Morris, its terrazzo floors and its black-and-white marble wainscotting.

“We don’t generally hold covenants, and the city has been unwilling to do so,” said Ian Johnson, a historian with the State Historic Preservation Office.

The Postal Service has made an initial proposal to the preservation agency for a covenant, Johnson said. “But we told them it will likely be difficult to get someone to hold it,” he said.

The Postal Service has put the property up for sale, part of the agency’s nationwide cost-cutting effort in the face of the ongoing recession that has sharply cut into Postal Service revenue. No buyer has yet been lined up.

A covenant is a contract in which the covenanter makes a promise to a covenantee to do or not do some action. When it comes to the downtown post office, placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985, that would likely entail such stipulations as forbiding a new owner from doing something like painting over the Morris murals that were installed in the post office lobby in 1943, or removing the tile floors or marble wainscotting.

If a future owner tried to do such a thing, the holder of the covenant would be legally responsible for it, Johnson said.

Ron Anderson, a spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service in Portland, said whoever buys the building would be bound by rules regarding federal buildings listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

But that’s not necessarily true, Johnson said. Only federal agencies, or those local governments or persons using federal funds, are protected by the 1966 National Historic Preservation Act that created the registry, Johnson said. Therefore, the transfer of federal property that is either listed, or is eligible for listing on the registry, to an entity that is not held to the restrictions is considered a negative impact on a historic structure, he said.

However, any owner of the property, public or private, needs to comply with the city’s preservation ordinance, Johnson said. Discussions are now centering on the city’s landmark guidelines and how they could protect the art deco building, he said. The building was listed in 1988 as a historical city landmark.

The Postal Service said it hopes to either stay in the building by leasing space from a new owner, or find space to lease elsewhere in downtown Eugene.

The city’s historic preservation program is administered through the city’s land use code, which sets rules for such things as the altering and demolition of historic properties, said Gabe Flock, a senior planner with the city. If the owner of a historic property wants to alter it, that must be approved through a land-use process, Flock said.

The city is consulting with its attorney to look at its legal options as a third-party protector of the post office building, he said.

Flock sent a memo to Mayor Kitty Piercy and the City Council in February that says if the building is purchased by someone other than a public agency, the property, currently zoned as public land, would need to be rezoned. One possibility would be for the city to create a special zoning area that would ensure the building is preserved while allowing a range of office or commercial uses.

The government offers financial incentives to owners of historic properties who keep historic features.

The Postal Service building is assessed at $2.1 million, but as a federal agency the Postal Service pays no property taxes on it.

A future private owner could apply to put the building in the Oregon Special Assessment Program, which is a 10-year property tax freeze for historic properties, Flock wrote. As part of that program, the owner can’t dismantle historic features. Also, the state and the U.S. Department of the Interior offer financial assistance for major building-rehabilitation projects that conform to historic preservation requirements.