New Damascus Mayor Steve Spinnett has been a vocal critic of Metro and the effects of its planning requirements on his city. Last week, Spinnett talked with Metro's reporter about the planning for his city.
Take me through a little bit of the background of the Ask Damascus movement. (At the September joint Damascus City Council/Metro Council meeting), it seemed like everybody was a little kumbaya. But it's clear that's not the case – this movement, the ballot initiatives, your slogan…
… "Let's take Damascus back." And I also have signs, "This is our town, not Metro's." I know you work for Metro, but that was a real political winner. It didn't matter if people lived in subdivisions or they had 180 acres.
Why does that resonate?
We voted for incorporation for two reasons. Number one, we wanted local control. Number two, we didn't want to get swallowed up. We were told we were going to get swallowed up by other municipalities such as Gresham and Happy Valley. Ever since then, our current local control was not at all transparent or receptive. It's just been an ongoing problem.
The reason community voted for incorporation – it was quite a significant tax increase, and a lot of people regret voting for it now – it was for local control. There was a premium price put on that. It raised our property taxes 30-some percent. That's significant. But they were willing to do that for the advertised reason of local control. So as time went on, we found out that we are actually, and our city made and signed an IGA with Metro without asking the public.
I mean, you've got to look at it from our perspective. An IGA with Metro which involves billions of dollars of private property, controls and places restrictions on private property, was done at a city council meeting without even a worksession. That's mind boggling to me. But that's not just one thing. Historically, that's kind of been the case.
And so, bottom line, it's really a land use. And then they rammed this, more recently they just rammed this comprehensive plan through because they wanted to get it before the end of the year. Everybody knows the planning commission wanted more time. The Committee for Citizen Involvement requested more time. They were ignored. They also made significant changes to the plan without vetting it through the public. Because they wanted to meet this deadline. And it wasn't a real deadline. The state wasn't going to reject it. There was no legitimate excuse. That's just one more thing the council did that irritated the public.
Where does the comprehensive plan stand with this council?
Right now there's a signature drive for a referendum. We got the signatures in a few days. That was easy. It freezes the process. DLCD (the Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development) can still look at it and nobody can stop them from looking at a frozen document. But it will go to a vote in May. And we'll let the citizens decide it.
And it's not to remove it. The referendum is not to get rid of it and start over. The referendum is taking another look at it and make some fixes.
What kind of fixes would you like to see?
The biggest one, and I can get public testimony lined up all day long on this one, is the 100-200 foot stream buffers, even for seasonal streams. You've got to picture this. You've got somebody with a field that's 400 feet wide and they've proposed a 200 foot buffer. Their retirement just went up in vapor. We've been communicating with Metro, but we're looking at the Metro tables on streams and Metro's at 15 feet to 200 feet depending on the situation. So, the council, we'd love to blame Metro on this one but actually, I think Metro's offering a lot more flexibility than our council.
How does that compare to, say, 100 year flood plains?
We're not talking about floodplains at all. Or even wetlands. These are just stream buffers.
So, aside from that, is there an overall anger with the actual plan and where the centers are and the medium residential and so on?
No. That's not really the issue. That's not been raised. The ideas for the town centers, I've heard some little nitpicky complaints but it's not significant. The community is not going to deny that. By and large, I think those centers make a lot of sense. Personally, I like them. There's a lot of people that just flat don't want the higher density. I like the sense of community. I'm of the age, I'm of the culture that I'd love to get up and walk down to the coffee shop and hang out. I think they're going to provide a sense of community, which is one of our core values.
The problem is very much the excessive restrictions. The 200 foot setbacks. It's more, they want to run lot of other things through those big setbacks. Bike trails, walking trails, riparian corridors. The problem with that is the city needs to compensate people for those properties and they have no system. They can designate the land that way and if they have the land designated then the people are restricted then they've not come up with the compensation plan. That's a problem. That's a real problem. We haven't come up with a plan yet to communicate, and in the meantime you're sitting there looking at your property and not doing anything. That's the huge, huge issue.
Going back to the stream thing, and I think hillsides are part of this to. Why not create a compensation plan? Why not create something that, for those who are going to benefit from development, part of their benefit is to compensate people who can't, because of the stream setbacks?
I think everybody agrees - the planning commission person agrees, the code developer agrees, (City Manager) Jim Bennett agrees - nowhere have they ever worked. They're just unsuccessful, because you need a willing buyer and a willing seller at the same time. It's just hard to match up.
The system development charges. You were part of the organization that put in the requirement that those have to be voted on. Why is that a benefit to Damascus to have such a restriction on SDCs?
I agreed with the mood of Damascus. They just had a 30 percent tax increase and they saw no benefit. I didn't want to throw another possible tax, fee, charge of any kind. What they want to see is progress. And then present this SDC charge at the right time when progress is made. The mood in this town, and I think I'm probably the most qualified person to say this because I've talked to the most people in Damascus the last four, five months by far. The mood here is not a real trust in city government. And so, also, there's not a real trust in the forthrightness in what a SDC charge is. They didn't define it at all the last time around.
It's a pretty basic thing that cities around the country use. You want to build a subdivision, you pay for the sewer connection.
I would have to agree with you on that. It's common sense, that if you want to build a house, you have to pay for the house, but what about all the infrastructure that gets to the house. Who pays for that? Does that just come out of thin air? Well, a person that's not involved would say, my taxes just went up 30 percent, where did that go? And they have an argument.
But they're not the ones paying the SDC.
What we're talking about now, it needs to be defined. Because people think, thought and again, it's a communication problem in Damascus. They left it pretty nebulous. You know what nebulous means, the truth comes out after the election. So I'm already on record, I've already told people, that I will be in favor of an SDC charge depending how it's presented.
To what degree do the charges have to go to the voters? Each subdivision? Each type of charge?
Somebody said there's a flat fee whether you want to remodel your house or build your house. I disagree with that. I think it has to be a percentage of the value of the house. I really do. Because it doesn't make sense for someone to have to cough up $30,000-40,000 to remodel their garage, increase their garage. And every time somebody goes in for a building permit to rewire their house or put a roof on, I don't think the SDCs should apply to that because they're not enlarging the demand for services. So, yeah, I think SDC charges are good and it wouldn't be for those people that are building something that demands services.
Now, here's the smart part on the city if they can get over their mental block. Allow people to develop on well and septic, low density. Charge them SDC charges. There's no cost to the city. That's some serious profit. Not only an SDC charge, but also, the property tax revenue that comes from a home on the hill. Allow that. That's, I would be open to that. Somebody building a $4-500,000 house, a $30,000 SDC charge is almost doable.
Here's what people don't want. And this is what was not defined the first time around. People don't want higher density. They perceived an SDC charge as another tax. Why would they want to pay a tax to have high density come in here which is something they didn't want in the first place? And that's exactly how they perceive it. The city just did a very poor job of packaging this.
Some folks might say that higher density equals more customers equals more businesses equals more economic vitality. Not necessarily high density like inner southeast Portland but 15 units per acres equals, hey, we can get a Trader Joe's out here. Isn't that what Damascus also wants?
It's called high density with compensation that I agree with. Not cash compensation. But if you have high density, you've got storefront underneath, you have amenities. Have some smart code – not smart growth, I really want to distinguish the difference – have smart code people. We had a panel of people rate different projects. It's not just the living quarters. It's porch-to-porch. What else is there? They have amenities. They can walk to a park and they can shop below. I think there are certain areas of town – not very many – where we could do that high, high density with amenities.
That's high density with compensation. People will want to live there. What we're really going to fight is some of this Gresham, big, we don't want that. We just don't want that.
Skinny houses?
Apartments. The whole apartment thing. The crime, too. The apartment thing next to a bike trail. These guys are up to mischief, the cops come and they run into the apartments. I think there's a pretty strong will in Damascus to not allow that to happen.
What should Metro do better for Damascus? What would you like to see – I don't know if you've met with the new councilors. What have you told them you think Metro should improve upon?
I talked about my campaign slogan. I know you're probably aware of my campaign slogan. And they're new councilors and they weren't offended because they weren't on the council. They listened. And, I don't remember what I actually told them. I just expressed to them that Damascus wants to determine its own future. The people that live here are the ones to determine the future. If I had to do it over again, talk to them again, I would want to use Metro, especially with the regional connectivity, with transportation, all of those things, make sure it fits their plan of transportation. Where we connect to Gresham. Where we connect to Happy Valley. All of those things. Let us design our own city. Take the Urban Growth Management plan. Start taking out all the 'shalls' and put in the 'mays.' There's too many. How can you have local control when you have so many 'shalls.' Title 13, Title 11, they're just 'shalls.'
But for a city, I'm just going to throw, say, Sherwood out here as an example. That is also trying to meet these requirements. Is it fair for you guys to say, we want to be this way, when Sherwood has already come up with its plan based on all the 'shalls?'
I do think it's fair. And it's also fair that just because Happy Valley sent a letter to Damascus - they didn't think it was fair, too, that they were at a 10 units per acre density requirement and we're at eight. We fought for eight. To our city council's credit, we fought for eight. That's their (Happy Valley's) problem. They should have done it different if they wanted it different. So, no, I don't. We're a newer city than Sherwood. I think we're under more requirements than they are. The Urban Growth Management Functional Plan's gone through I think three changes in the last few years. And they weren't advertised, when they were incorporated, with local control. It's the restrictions. When I say, Metro going even into your backyard, that's really literal. They're going into backyard telling you what kind of plants you can plant or not plant. If you look on, I think Page 97, you've got to get permission for maintenance of your home. This is getting very invasive. Talk about invasive species, this is invasive.
What kind of plants can't you plant?
Non-invasive, has to be plants from here – native.
What else?
Damascus is a test case. I believe it can work. I'd really like Metro to just make a lot of, show good faith and make some concessions. I'll give you one of them.
At the top of Title 11, there's a place in there, and I think it's under 11.3.07.1130, there is basically a moratorium on development or any rezoning from once land gets put into the urban growth boundary to when they finish the comprehensive plan. That's really hamstringing people with 30 acres or 100 acres, 10 acres, they can't subdivide their property. They've been waiting seven years already. And then, some people are saying they won't be issuing permits for another possibly four years. Release that moratorium. Allow very low density lot dividing. And I'm thinking about doing an article called "Held Hostage in Damascus" because landowners feel like they're held hostage. "If you don't agree with this plan you can't do anything." That's where we are, right in the Metro rules.
You're saying even if the comp plan is approved by the voters in May, and approved by the state, it's still four years before (development can happen)?
I had a councilor that's actually involved in work with the city of Gresham who said it's probably going to be four years before we can permit. And he's probably right, unfortunately, because the process has taken longer than we thought already. So, I would like to see Metro change that rule or allow some kind of a variance to it. Not remove the law but write in some kind of exclusion.
There's quite a few people who have talked to the city staff. They have 30 acres and they have to sell either all of it or part of it. But they have kids they want to sell a chunk of it to. They want to stay in Damascus. It'll improve the economy, it won't put a big burden on infrastructure because it's not high density, it's not subdivisions. I wouldn't allow subdivisions. I would say it has to be part of the master plan. But at least allow them to do it. So if you want to take a message to Metro, that would be it.