MILWAUKIE – Metro’s Chief Operating Officer questioned the principles that drive Oregon land use law Monday at a meeting with members of the North Clackamas County Chamber of Commerce.
Michael Jordan, presenting his recommended Community Investment Strategy and urban growth boundary adjustments for roughly the 23rd time, said economic uncertainty makes it hard to adhere to the Oregon’s land use laws and plan well.
Oregon law says Metro has to have enough land within the urban growth boundary for 20 years of development, and should review its available land inventory every five years.
“We don’t have a clue what the economy’s going to be like in 20 years,” Jordan said. “Five years, maybe. Beyond that, the crystal ball gets really blurry about, what will the land supply necessities be for the economy 20 years from now?”
Jordan was responding to concerns from Ed Gronke, a chamber member and an alternate on the Metro Policy Advisory Committee.
“I know you have to do what you’re doing, but it strikes me this whole region is going through a huge number of expensive gyrations because of the present state of the law,” Gronke said. “Don’t you think it’s time the state revisits the legislation? There has to be a better way of doing it now. It’s making it almost impossible to get anything done.”
Jordan said he expects there will be some serious discussion about the five year cycle and the 20 year supply. That could be a topic for the regional task force that Metro staff is organizing; Metro has committed $3 million for the task force’s staff needs for the next three years.
Metro’s staff has already suggested one shake-up in the way the agency handles land availability. Jordan has suggested the agency revisit the availability of large lot employment lands annually, so that if a large lot site is developed, and no new sites have come online through environmental cleanup or parcel aggregation, Metro could expand the urban growth boundary within a year to add another large lot industrial site.
“I think there’s robust dialogue to come,” Jordan said, acknowledging that only a few jurisdictions really want more land added to the boundary outright. “The vast majority of what I’m hearing from now is, ‘Maybe we ought to take a deep breath and do some reevaluation of this process.”
The meeting was relatively short, as many on hand for the chamber’s regular meeting had already been on hand for one of the first 22 stops on Jordan’s tour of the region. There were few specific questions about the urban growth boundary, nor about Jordan’s proposed task force.
But the task force did come up. Jon Egge, a business owner and a member of the Cascade Policy Institute’s board, wondered whether Metro and other agencies were genuinely looking at business friendliness. He said regulations across the region discourage business development.
“Their intentions are well founded, they’re sincere in their efforts, but the totality of them becomes a huge weight,” Egge said.
Jordan, a former city manager and Clackamas County Commissioner, said he understood.
“These things add up on the expense side of the ledger,” he said. “You’re trying to do a pro forma and there’s a two or three year regulatory process to go through before we can even think about turning dirt. That’s a lot of money to get through that process.”
Jordan said the task force, which is still in development and will have 15 to 25 members, will be fairly stacked with private sector representatives. He also said one of the things they could look at is increasing uniformity in development, pointing to how quickly areas like Clackamas County and Hillsboro can get projects into development compared to larger jurisdictions like Portland.
“This is a big rock up a steep hill, and it will take a cross-sectoral approach,” Jordan said.
This story was not subject to the approval of Metro staff or elected officials.