A rapidly expanding out-of-state credit union has gobbled up the prominent vacant Shari’s Café and Pies restaurant in Springfield’s Gateway area and plans to demolish the hexagonal building and put up a credit union branch and drive-thru.
Lacey, Washington-based TwinStar Credit Union bought the boarded-up Shari’s property on May 7 for an undisclosed price, according to the deed. Several weeks earlier, TwinStar representatives had met with Springfield planning staff to discuss razing the six-sided building and replacing it with the branch, records show.
TwinStar has a minimal public profile in Lane County, but it actually has a big presence here. Eugene-based Northwest Community Credit Union is part of TwinStar. Northwest Community kept its name after merging into and becoming a division of TwinStar in 2023. Northwest has four branches and a main office in Lane County.
How soon TwinStar will begin work on the site is unclear. “We are still in early stages of deciding what go forward looks like and no specific plans or timelines have been determined,” says Laurie Kresl, TwinStar vice president of marketing.
Shari’s shutdown
The financially ailing Beaverton-based Shari’s chain late last year shut all 42 of its Oregon restaurants, including its four in Eugene-Springfield. Shari’s has kept restaurants in Washington and Idaho open, news reports say.
Shari’s did not own the buildings in which its Oregon restaurants operated. Many irate landlords have sued the fast-shrinking company for non-payment of rent.
The Gateway Shari’s, a high-visibility, high-traffic spot, has undergone rapid ownership changes since Shari’s shut it last October.
The building’s longtime owner, Florida-based investor Stephen Marik Brockman, in November sold the property for an undisclosed sum to Lane County businessman Richard Boyles, according to the deed.
Boyles is a major property developer and investor in Lane County, with hotel, retail and commercial holdings as well as a winery. He is heavily invested in north Gateway.
His Sycan B. Corp. is headquartered in and owns the Gateway Marketplace commercial complex that flanks the Shari’s property on two sides. His businesses own two hotels across Beltline Road, plus nearby retail properties on Gateway Street.
Site control
Boyles tells Eugene Weekly that when he saw the Shari’s chain was on the ropes, he jumped at buying the building “because I wanted to have a say over who goes into that spot.” He initially sought to lease the property to another restaurant, but that fell through, he says, so he sold to TwinStar, even though he admits he is normally “a buy and hold sort of person.”
Before selling, he put a 20-year deed restriction on the property so it can only be used for a “financial institution” such as a bank or credit union.
Earlier this year, TwinStar representatives met with city staff to discuss parking, stormwater and other issues involved in redevelopment, city records show. Custom built for Shari’s 30 years ago, the structure and its one acre have a market value of $2.2 million, the Lane County assessor’s office estimates.
Other sites empty
NCCU members in 2023 voted to become part of TwinStar. The combined entity has $4 billion-plus in assets (a banking term that mostly means money loaned out to people), about 800 employees, three dozen branches and 250,000 members.
The three other Shari’s buildings in Eugene-Springfield remain shuttered and the owners do not appear to have sold them.
• A Texas investment group owns the Shari’s at the Pioneer Plaza/Safeway center at Pioneer Parkway and Q Street in Springfield.
• A Portland investor owns the one at West 11th Avenue and Oak Patch Road in Eugene.
• Corvallis-based investors own the one at River Road in Eugene just north of Randy Papé Beltline.
Bricks $ Mortar is a column anchored by Christian Wihtol, who worked as an editor and writer at The Register-Guard in Eugene 1990-2018, much of the time focused on real estate, economic development and business. Reach him at Christian@EugeneWeekly.com.