A Brief Starwood History
In early 1973, Thomas Pickett and Douglas Dickinson, two principals in the Bernard Corporation of Anchorage, Alaska, arrived in Central Oregon searching for development opportunities. They located two parcels totaling 300 acres, formerly used as pasture by Bend Dairy.
In 1977, Pickett and Dickinson presented a plan to the Deschutes County Planning Commission for an upscale mobile home park of more than 170 approximately one-quarter acre lots to be laid out in clusters around cul-de-sacs. The planning commission granted a Condition Use Permit containing various restrictions. Restrictions included: no more than 177 lots were to be developed and the pasture area fronting the parcels would remain zoned Exclusive Farm Use (EFU) and could never be developed. Meanwhile, one individual, Ralph Reynolds, challenged the Conditional Use Permit, which delayed the development of the mobile home park.
The lengthy delay in obtaining a permit to build, depleted Pickett and Dickinson's finances. The two men decided to revise their plans and market Starwood as an adult solar home community. They created a set of Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions (CC&Rs) that included age restrictions and stringent solar specifications.
Construction and sale of Starwood's Phase One "Energy Saving" Solar homes began in the spring of 1983. Originally, seven solar homes were built on North Star Way. The 1980s economic recession challenged Starwood's growth, as did the stringent CC&Rs and age limit. Residents, led by Marguerite Mitchell, challenged the age and solar restrictions in the Starwood CC&Rs. Development ceased and the restrictions were eventually rescinded, but the bank foreclosed on Pickett and Dickinson. Susan McDougal, doing business as Lee Investments, Inc., became Starwood's new owner and development resumed.
McDougal retained Dickinson's services to oversee construction of the remaining infrastructure. McDougal also worked with builder J.R. Reynolds to create the Architectural Review Committee (ARC) and designed the construction requirements that govern Starwood today. McDougal owned a majority of the unsold lots and held a controlling vote in the Starwood Association until the remaining lots were sold. Sole control and ownership of Starwood passed to the Association homeowners as a collective group in the mid-1990s. No other entity holds any interest in Starwood.