Protection vs. development battle continues
Three Metro counties plus Metro are trying to figure out the Urban Growth Boundary’s next look
SUBMITTED MAP / COURTESY OF METRO
This map indicates areas outside the metropolitcan Portland Urban Growth Boundary that are candidates for “urban reserves.” The map incorrectly shows all of the Stafford Triangle as suggested urban reserve. The eastern portion of the Stafford area, north of I-205, is not suggested as an urban reserve.
A new round of scuffling is beginning over the future shape of the Portland metro area, as public officials, developers and others jockey over outlying parcels to urbanize – or protect from development – over the next half-century.
Advisory committees for Clackamas, Multnomah and Washington counties are finishing lists of potential “urban reserves” and “rural reserves,” as required by a 2007 state law. Urban reserves would form a pool of developable land Metro draws upon over the next 40 to 50 years when it expands Portland’s urban growth boundary. Rural reserves would be off-limits to urbanization for the same period.
Metro’s Reserves Steering Committee were winnowing the two lists Wedneday, April 8, and then put them out for public scrutiny.
The process could shape the future of sensitive areas such as:
n The Stafford Triangle between Lake Oswego, West Linn and Tualatin.
n The hills west of Forest Park in Portland.
n Prime Tualatin Valley farmland.
n Orient and surrounding areas west of the Sandy River.
n Sauvie Island.
Metro, a tri-county regional government, is obliged to provide land for 20 years of population growth inside the urban growth boundary – which protects rural lands and focuses development in built-up areas.
Past Metro efforts to expand the boundary have been messy, and often fizzled under legal appeal.
The 2007 Legislature devised an optional method for expanding the urban growth boundary, which would enable development of prime, close-in farmlands, such as potential job centers outside Hillsboro.
The new law, Senate Bill 1011, requires an uncommon degree of cooperation among the three counties and Metro. They must jointly submit rationale for the urban and rural reserves to the state Land Conservation and Development Commission.
The law is a recipe for horse-trading, allowing development of some lands as tradeoffs for protecting others. But that hasn’t stopped quibbling over long contentious hot spots such as the Stafford area and Hillsboro-area farmland.
“It does have a certain groundhog quality to it,” observed Greg Leo, lobbyist for the city of Wilsonville.
At a reserves steering committee meeting on March 16, West Linn Mayor Patti Galle was aghast that the Clackamas County advisory committee listed the Stafford Triangle as a possible urban reserve.
Lake Oswego and West Linn have long opposed urbanization of the pastoral area outside their borders, and say they don’t have the money or desire to provide roads, sewers and other services needed for subdivisions or other construction.
“Nobody’s been listening,” Galle said. “Cities are entitled to their own unique vision of their future,” she said.
Developers and others say Stafford makes sense for urbanization, because it’s close to developed areas, hugs Interstate 205 and lacks prime farmland.
But within the Stafford area, discussion among property owners is tense as Metro inches closer to a decision about protecting the area’s rural character or opening it for development.
Inside Stafford
The Stafford Hamlet, an advisory group to the Clackamas County Board of Commissioners, has convened meetings among residents for years, gathering people in churches and schools and pressing the populace toward shared goals for the future of the Stafford Triangle.
The Hamlet first formed in 2006 to prevent surrounding cities, counties and Metro from deciding the area’s future without input from the people that live there.
As a decision about future zoning comes near, emotions are running high in Stafford.
Since forming in 2006, the hamlet has fostered dialogue between two distinct sides of the debate surrounding development: landowners with large parcels who want to build and small property owners who want the area’s rural charms preserved.
Led by a board with both interests in mind, the hamlet adopted a vision statement March 19, essentially agreeing on a mix of urban development and rural protections for Stafford.
But the accord that was struck between would-be developers and their rural neighbors threatened to fall apart when a group of large landowners, some of whom were members of the hamlet’s board of directors, recently drafted more than 20 letters to the Clackamas County Commissioners advocating to develop the area.
“It’s getting hotter because decisions are about to be made. The people interactions are not pleasant,” said Carol Yamada, also a director on the hamlet’s board.
As talk continues about which lands should develop, and at what densities development should occur, Yamada said the conversation continues to hit upon a wide range of viewpoints.
Some people support the dense development ideas advocated by Metro, offering suggestions that include clustered housing, a golf course and retail areas. Others want room for property owners to maintain horses, gardens and a closeness to wildlife that’s typical of life in Stafford today.
As surrounding cities look on, “Stafford is a bright and shiny star on everybody’s map,” Yamada said.
West Linn has advocated for the area to remain a rural reserve. Tualatin, by contrast, has advocated for development of portions of Stafford, including areas south of I-205.
Lake Oswego has yet to offer its suggestions for Stafford, though the city has previously advocated for preserving the area’s rural charms and keeping development there at low densities. Officials in the city say they are currently drafting an opinion but offered no details.
Clackamas County is suggesting that the Stafford area be studied for urban development. That suggestion will be weighed against other land needs in the region as Metro and the counties come to a decision.
A look by county
A similar controversy between preservationists and pro-development forces ended in Multnomah County two weeks ago when its citizens advisory committee removed Sauvie Island from its urban reserves list.
The island is prime farmland and wildlife habitat, and lacks enough bridge capacity to serve residential subdivisions.
That leaves three potential urban reserves in Multnomah County: 6,040 acres west of the Sandy River near Orient, a West Hills tract of 2,640 acres west of Forest Park and a 50-acre tract along the road to Sauvie Island.
In a sign of the sensitive nature of remaining undeveloped lands inside Multnomah County, each of the three areas, along with Sauvie Island, also are candidates for rural reserves.
Clackamas County, which has more rural lands than Multnomah County, lists 40,000 acres of potential urban reserves, including the Stafford Triangle, plus the Boring and Beavercreek areas. To put that in perspective, the entire area inside Portland’s urban growth boundary is 260,000 acres.
But that pales in comparison to Washington County’s list of potential urban reserves, now set at 106,000 acres. That’s enough land for 10 cities the size of Beaverton.
Washington County heeded requests of area cities that wanted to expand their boundaries by 46,000 acres, and it incorporated feedback from a business coalition that cited other good lands to develop. The resulting urban reserves proposal is largely a simple line beyond the developed part of the county.
Metro Councilor Kathryn Harrington, who is overseeing the urban and rural reserve process, acknowledged that will make it hard for citizens to provide meaningful feedback on such a wide swath of land.
Washington County was “the most flagrant in not giving us meaningful maps,” said Mary Kyle McCurdy, a planner for 1000 Friends of Oregon who sits on the Reserves Steering Committee. The county’s urban reserves list includes virtually the entire Tualatin Valley, McCurdy said.
Brent Curtis, Washington County planning director, said the county wanted to err on the conservative side and not exclude lands for consideration before they can be evaluated thoroughly.
Once Washington County gets more serious about specific sites to urbanize, Council Creek could be a dividing line. McCurdy said her group will oppose any urbanization north of Council Creek, in the Forest Grove and Cornelius areas. The group would be more amenable, she said, to adding urban reserves along Evergreen Road, considered prime development property for industrial use.
The Homebuilders Association of Metropolitan Portland, based in Lake Oswego is staying clear of recommending specific areas for urbanization, because its members have different views on prime parcels, said Dave Nielsen, chief executive.
The homebuilders are skeptical that the Metro Council will permit much new land for urban reserves, he said, given strong sentiments on the council in favor of denser development inside the urban growth boundary.
After upcoming public hearings, Metro expects to pare down the urban and rural reserves lists during the spring and summer. Then there’d be a series of showdown votes by the four local governments to approve the reserves lists, starting in September.
“Trying to get unanimous agreement from all four is going to be difficult, from the way things are going,” Nielsen said.
If the four entities can’t agree, Metro must use its older, oft-maligned method of expanding the urban growth boundary, where prime farming soils made parcels ineligible for urbanization.