By HARRY ESTEVE
The Register-Guard

Building a warehouse, factory or big discount store in Eugene's most high-profile wetland area will be easier to do under a new, streamlined permit procedure, city officials say.

It won't be any cheaper, however, so don't expect to see a huge rush to develop the west Eugene industrial area, according to developers.

But some property owners say they have been waiting for years for just this announcement, and they're breathing easier.

"That's pretty exciting news," said Randy Cuddeback whose Cuddeback Lumber Co. owns and wants to develop land near the corner of West 11th Avenue and Belt Line Road "Basically, a lot of people have been tied up for several years now, waiting for this to happen."

Developers who want to build in the west Eugene industrial area -- which includes several thousand acres of prime wetlands -- now can get a permit directly from the city instead of being forced to seek separate approval from state and federal wetlands regulators.

It has been taking a minimum of 90 days and frequently more than a year to get the wetland fill permit required before development can occur in the area, Cuddeback said.

The new procedure will cut the waiting period to about 45 days, said Dehorah Evans, senior environmental analyst for the city.

"We're finally able to make good on our promise to put some certainty into the development process in west Eugene," Evans said.

At the same tlme, the city will preserve large tracts of the best wetlands and will continue turning other areas of vacant land into productive wetlands, Evans said.

"It's a big deal for us," she said. "It's what we've been working toward for six years or more."

The city's ability to issue the permits came after the Division or State Lands and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approved a city plan that targeted certain parcels for wetland protection and others for development.

Eugene is the first city in the nation to receive local authority to issue wetland permits to developers, according to a city news release. Before a permit is issued, it still must receive final approval from the Corps of Engineers, however.

"The initial track we started out on was to get a general permit from the Corps," which would have given the city complete authority to approve wetland developments, Evans said. "As we worked through the issues the Corps pulled back and said they need to retain some piece of it."

Wetlands are considered environmentally sensitive areas because they serve as critical habitat for a large numher of birds and wildlife as well as native and endangered plant species. Wetlands also provide for natural flood control and they filter chemical impurities from water.

Under federal law, anyone who develops an acre of wetlands must "mitigate" for the environmental loss, either by creating an equal-sized wetland elsewhere or making improvements to an existing wetland.

Eugene, however, will offer another option -- a choice of buying into the city's growing "bank" of wetland property. For a cost of $30,000 an acre, developers can buy into the city's wetland bank and avoid the expense and trouble of creating a wetland to offset the one they filled in.

The cost will continue to discourage development in the area, which once was tagged as Eugene's prime industrial growth area.

"If it costs you $30,000 an acre to mitigate and it's not worth $30,000 when you're done, what's the point," said John Brown, a property appraiser who worked with west Eugene land owners. "Uncertainty is one issue, but the cost of mitigation is one of the top considerations."