Issues
The MTNA sometimes gets involved in helping engage neighbors and helping them be heard on different issues and projects in our neighborhood. MTNA focuses primarily on being a convener and helping neighbors have a voice on decisions that affect them rather than picking winners and losers when the community is split on an issue or project. Traditionally, the MTNA has supported neighbors who are seeking to have the City enforce its codes and regulations.
Proposed Dairy Queen Redevelopment Project
On December 29, 2025, the City decided to allow the Dairy Queen redevelopment project to go forward with the proposed drive through. The City's decision recognized the input from community members both for pro and con. To read the City's full decision, click here.
TO READ THE MTNA FORMAL PUBLIC COMMENT TO THE CITY ON THE DAIRY QUEEN REDEVELOPMENT PROJECT LAND USE REVIEW (SUBMITTED 12/22/25) CLICK HERE.
For over 50 years the old Dairy Queen at SE 55th and Division was a much loved gathering space in our neighborhood. Some years ago the long-time owners sold the property. The new owners demolished the existing DQ building and said they intended to create a new two-story DQ with indoor seating and an expanded drive through. The previous DQ did not have indoor seating.
The current City of Portland Zoning Code regulations do not allow new drive-through facilities in the Mixed Use Commercial 2 (CM2)--that is the zoning that applies to the old DQ property. The Code is attempting to discourage auto-oriented uses in favor of more pedestrian-oriented uses and to reduce the effects of noise and air pollution from idling cars. The Code does allow prior drive-through facilities to continue to be used when a property is redeveloped if the project meets certain criteria--including redeveloping the property within three years of the end of the previous use.
Community members have an opportunity to share their thoughts with the City about the legality of the proposed drive through. The deadline for sharing your comments with the City is 5 p.m., Monday, December 22, 2025. See below for more info.
Below you will find some background about the project, information about the MTNA position on the project, details about how to submit your formal public comments to the City, and links to get more information and review relevant documents and information.
BACKGROUND
In May 2025, the MTNA sent a letter to the current owners of the former DQ property at the address listed in the City's property records. The MTNA let them know that community members were interested in finding out what their plans were for the site and invited them to come to an MTNA meeting. We didn't hear back from them.
In early July 2025, a community member reached out to the MTNA and raised a concern that the City appeared not to be applying the three-year time limit for grandfathering in continued use of a previous drive through. The three-year limit appeared to have expired. The community member noted that the property is on the FX2-Division high-capacity transit corridor--a major public investment intended to support walkability, reliable transit service and a shift aware from car dependency. They asserted that allowing the drive-through would reintroduce auto-oriented design to a major transit corridor, create new conflicts between turning vehicles, pedestrians, and buses, and would set a damaging precedent of allowing expired nonconforming uses elsewhere in the city. They also asserted that reintroducing a drive-through would be out of alignment with adopted City policy, threaten years of community advocacy for a more walkable, transit-supportive Division corridor, and appear to violate the Portland Zoning Code. The community member argued that the City should formally substantiate that the drive-through is legally allowed before allowing the project to move forward. The community member asked the MTNA to ask the City to determine whether the proposed project meets the three-year limit regulation.
Subsequently, an MTNA board member found a 2024 article online that provided a description of the proposed new Dairy Queen. The article included a proposed site plan that showed the proposed two-story DQ and drawings of the proposed drive through lanes and on site parking. The article was recently updated. (See the updated version at "A Dairy Queen Grows in Portland: An Opening Update" .)
The MTNA discussed the request to oppose the proposed DQ drive-through at the regular MTNA meeting on July 16, 2025. The MTNA Board members voted to send a letter to the City opposing the drive-through without a formal determination that the drive-through met the legal requirements in the City Zoning Code. (You can view the August 1, 2025 MTNA letter here.)
On November 14, 2025, the DQ property owner, Mohan Grewal, attended the MTNA regular monthly meeting and shared his hopes and concerns with the MTNA. Mohan shared that he manages other DQs in the Portland region and had been approached by the former DQ owners who agreed to sell him the property if he would continue to operate a DQ on the site.
Mohan described frustrations he had with the City about the high cost and slow progress of the permit process. Mohan asserted that the drive-through was needed for the DQ to succeed at this location and that the City had not raised the issue about the three-year time limit until late in the process after Mohan had spent a significant amount of money on the project.
(To learn more about Mohan's arguments in favor of the project, click here to read a letter (apparently prepared by Mohan) asking neighbors to support the DQ redevelopment project. This letter was posted on Nextdoor on December 12, 2025.)
On November 25, 2025, Paul Leistner and Alex Roy (representing the MTNA Board) met with Mohan at the DQ property. Mohan shared a traffic study he had hired a firm to develop for the project in May 2019.
On December 1, 2025 the City of Portland sent out a public notice inviting public comment on the question of the legality of allowing the drive through as part of the proposed DQ project. (See below for more info.)
The City appears to need to determine whether the fact that Mohan had a permit, plus the emails and other interactions he had with the City related to the project would constitute the "continued use" required to meet the three-year time limit between the previous use and the new use. (The MTNA Board members are not attorneys. This is our understanding--not a legal interpretation of the Code.) One important issue at stake here is the precedent for a property owner anywhere in Portland to maintain the right to develop a project that includes a nonconforming use that is no longer allowed under the Portland Zoning Code.
On December 12, 2025, neighbors on SE 55th contacted the MTNA to share their concerns about the potential for the proposed DQ redevelopment to increase in traffic on their otherwise quiet street. To mitigate this impact, they would like the City to consider:
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a left turn only sign as folks leave the DQ site [and exit onto SE 55th]
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a barrier in the street that prevents right hand turns [on SE 55th as people exit the DQ property]
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a crosswalk to make it safe for students and others to cross Division [to reach the DQ]
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speedbumps on 55th to slow traffic (if other options aren't available to mitigate traffic)
On December 16, 2025, a Mt. Tabor neighbor got a copy of the applicant's attorney's arguments to the City of why they believe the proposed drive through meets the City's requirements for continuing a non-conforming use. Click here to see a copy.
MTNA POSITION
The MTNA has heard from community members that really want the DQ to come back. We've heard from others that are concerned about traffic and parking impacts, pedestrian safety, impacts on the Trimet's FX2-Division bus line, and the precedent of allowing the reintroduction of an otherwise prohibited auto-oriented use on Division. Some community members also have raised concerns about the potential impacts of other types of development that might occur at the site if the DQ project does not go forward.
The MTNA has not taken a formal position either in support of, neutral on, or opposed to the overall DQ project. The MTNA is waiting to see whether the City can verify whether the proposed drive through meets the requirements in the Portland Zoning Code. The MTNA also would like to get more input from nearby neighbors and other community members who are directly affected by or interested in the proposed project.
The current formal MTNA position continues to be to oppose the inclusion of the drive through in the project without a formal determination by the City that the drive through meets the requirements in the Portland Zoning Code as stated in the MTNA letter to the City from August 1, 2025.
OPPORTUNITY FOR YOUR PUBLIC COMMENT TO THE CITY-- DEADLINE 5 P.M., MONDAY, DEC. 22, 2025
The City of Portland is the formal decision maker on how the DQ project moves forward.
On December 1, 2025 the City of Portland sent out a public notice to the MTNA and to 14 addresses of neighbors around the DQ property and others inviting public comment on the question of whether the property owner has the legal right under the Zoning Code to include the drive-through in the proposed DQ redevelopment project. (Click here to view the public notice the City sent out on Dec. 1, 2025.)
Anyone can submit public comment on this matter.
The deadline for community members to submit their comments is 5 p.m. on Monday, December 22, 2025. NOTE: City staff are looking for input from community members on whether the proposed drive-through meets that legal requirements in the City Zoning Code related to non-conforming drive throughs. (Click here to view a document prepared by the MTNA that excerpts the relevant sections of Portland's Zoning Code.)
If you want to submit public comments about the legality of the DQ project proposed drive through, please email your comments to City staff Andrew.Gulizia@portlandoregon.gov.
Be sure to your email includes the Case File Number: LU 25-083003.
You also can reach Andrew at: 503-823-7046.
CONTACTS AND USEFUL DOCUMENTS
You can reach City planner Andrew Gulizia at: Andrew.Gulizia@portlandoregon.gov; 503-823-7046
You can reach the property owner, Mohan Grewal, at: dairyqueen5605@gmail.com; mohangrewal@yahoo.com
You can reach the MTNA at: contact.mtna@gmail.com
Useful documents:
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City of Portland formal request for public comment sent out on Dec. 1, 2025
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Letter of support for DQ, apparently from Mohan Grewal (posted on Nextdoor on Dec. 12, 2025)
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MTNA letter opposing drive-through without determination that it meets City Zoning Code (Aug 1, 2025)