The capacity ordinance passed Dec. 16 by the Metro Council didn't just put into code a new framework for planning discussions in the region.
It also, in a sense, hit the reset button on the region's policy discussions, clearing the deck for Metro to help facilitate the Community Investment Initiative, said Michael Jordan, the agency's chief operating officer.
Still to come…
The capacity ordinance put quite a bit into code, but bits and pieces of the ordinance will carry forward to discussion in 2011:
The urban growth boundary. Because of the Oregon Land Conservation and Development Commission's remand of Washington County's urban and rural reserves, Metro couldn't expand the boundary in South Hillsboro, as Metro staff recommended. Once a reserves agreement can be reached with Washington County, the topic of a boundary expansion in South Hillsboro can be addressed.
Large lot industrial replenishment. The Metro Policy Advisory Committee, a group of mayors, county commissioners, special district representatives and citizens from across the region, is still hammering out recommendations for the Metro Council on such a system.
Title 11. Changes to the framework for the agency's requirement that cities plan areas before they're brought into the urban growth boundary still haven't been adopted. Once the Metro Council feels comfortable that stakeholders have had a chance to offer input on some affordable housing requirements in the section, it is likely to revisit the topic.
The announcement of the Leadership Council. The council will ostensibly have the ability to think about the needs of the region as a whole, and what it needs to become the greatest place. This group of private sector, nonprofit community and former elected officials is being put together. Metro staff says the group should be ready for its debut in February, but that announcement was originally expected in mid-autumn and has been pushed back a few times since.
Jordan issued myriad recommendations when he announced his Community Investment Strategy last August. Much of the reaction to those recommendations was aimed at Jordan's proposals for the 2010 urban growth boundary expansion and at suggested changes to the way Metro addresses future boundary adjustments.
With the changes now law, Jordan can direct attention to the third part of the strategy – the Initiative, a Metro-facilitated effort to address challenges on a regional scale.
An exploratory committee of regional leaders, along with Metro staff, have been working to recruit a task force, called the Leadership Council, which will meet for a couple of years, diagnosing regional problems and trying to come up with – and then sell – a solution for those problems.
The Leadership Council is expected to have about 20 members. Metro staff won't confirm who is among the dozen-or-so business leaders, nonprofit coordinators and former elected officials who have accepted invitations to the council.
"I think there are some really good brains on that list. They come from a myriad of backgrounds, which I think will give some credibility in places where we haven't traditionally engaged," Jordan said. "I think there's people there with the kind of gravitas, that when their name is mentioned, people will notice."
The Community Investment Initiative's goal isn't just to come up with a laundry list of projects, and then sell the public on a tax scheme to pay for them. It's about finding the best relationship for the public and private sector investments, and determining what public sector investments and regulations generate the most private sector investment.
While the Leadership Council will ultimately rely on some governing body, possibly Metro, to implement its recommendations, it's still designed to be a non-governmental force on the regional dialogue. Internally, the capacity ordinance's wake marks a victory in a slow shift to the agency's approach, Jordan said.
"It gets us even more entrenched in a place where we're talking about 'What are the best things for these communities to get to the outcomes we're looking for,' not just, 'Where's the next 20 acres?' or 'Where's the next large-lot industrial site at the edge?'" Jordan said. "It gets us really to a dialogue about the trade-offs between either reinvesting in a downtown or a corridor or an employment area, or creating the next new one… and that needs to be a robust comparison."
Jordan said he hopes that by the time the next boundary review comes around in 2015, the new rules adopted in the capacity ordinance (plus the Title 11 changes Metro is expected to wrap up in early 2011) will enable the agency to have that vigorous discussion.
"We are becoming more and more comfortable with the idea that Metro is not just a big planning agency," Jordan said. Getting Metro departments to view themselves as part of an agency that plans and implements, instead of just a loose conglomeration of disparate interests, has been a transition, he said.
"That's taken an evolution of thinking inside our own agency, to think about how our goals as an agency mesh with what we're trying to create in the region – how we talk about what we do and how we do it," Jordan said.