[Music] Hello everyone and welcome to the next edition of the council update. My name is Phil Jentz, your communications manager here at the city of Cottage Grove and with me today is council member Dave Theiti. Council member Theiti, welcome. >> Thanks Phil. I'm happy to be here. Council member Theiti, we've got an interesting topic to discuss today. Cedarhurst mansion. Uh I remember growing up just how beautiful Cedarhurst was and from what I can tell uh still is, but it has been vacant for a while. So what can you say about Cedarhurst's history? Well, Cedarhurst is certainly a gem of the Cottage Grove community and it has some amazing history behind it. In the early 1900s, famed architect Cass Gilbert transformed the mansion into a 26 room 12,000 square ft estate complete with a ballroom pipe organ and formal rose gardens. It even hosted US presidents uh Roosevelt, Tarding, Culage, Taft, and to say that Cedarhurst has a storied past is underelling it just a little bit. That's so remarkable. And it's it's also my understanding that uh it has stood vacant for a little while now and that there is a potential project in the works for the site. So what can you tell us about that? >> Yeah, it has changed ownership a few times over the years. Has been dormant for a little while. The last group was a rental housing group that actually restored older buildings that they would rent out and so forth. They needed to add more rental units to this property to make their plan work financially. But, uh, hey, now we have a group that has other event properties in the area actually interested in the mansion who have a vision of their own to restore Cedarhurst. Their potential project could bring the facilities up to a modern code for safety while also honoring the historic elements of the space, staying true to the things that make the grounds around the mansion as well as the mansion itself special. And what would Cedar Hurst be used for if this project comes to fruition? >> Yeah, the group's vision is to restore the historic elements of the mansion and add some modern amenities to the backside of the grounds where the old house, the original old house was and everything to allow for weddings, events, celebrations, and gatherings to take place. They feel they can get the return they need without additional revenue generating buildings on the property which will sit well with the residential properties currently surrounding the site and it's timely that we are discussing this potential project uh today. Uh this is a project that is still in the early stages and making its way through various public processes such as community meetings, planning commission, city council and so on. And so what happens with this project moving forward? Yeah, it's certainly not a done deal yet. There's still plenty of time. There's a public process that uh this will need to work its way through and there's plenty of time for review, due diligence, and honoring the public processes that need to take place like neighborhood meetings and things like that to get input from the community. Well, Council Member Theiti, uh thank you so much for your time today and sharing more information about Cedarhurst Mansion. >> You bet. I enjoyed it and uh you can certainly find more history on the internet and also the city's website will actually have some of the current planning information and such so you could go out there to see it. Uh so uh yeah. Well, thank you again council member Thei for joining us today. And that is all for this month's council update. If you'd like to learn more about the city, please visit our website or find us on social media and we would love to hear from you. Thank you as always to True Lens Community Media for producing this video and we will see you all next time. Thanks everyone. [Music]