A group looking at potential changes to greater Portland's urban growth boundary management process found its way to the bank Wednesday – specifically, a potential land bank in Damascus.
The idea of swapping development capacity in Damascus to justify UGB expansions elsewhere in the region was discussed at length Wednesday, as the Urban Growth Readiness Task Force held its second of five meetings in the Metro council chamber in Portland. They're trying to agree to a way for the Metro Council to adjust its urban growth boundary review process to provide more flexibility to local cities.
The state requires the Metro Council to keep a 20-year supply of developable land within the region's urban growth boundary, but also cannot expand the UGB if there is enough land for development already. In the region's land use management system, rapidly growing areas like Wilsonville can't bring new land in for development if there isn't a demonstrated regional need for more land.
Development has slowed on the UGB's edge because of a number of factors, chiefly the soaring costs of building the pipes, parks, schools and roads that come with new residential development. A sharp decline in federal infrastructure funding means the costs for those public services are increasingly being paid for by people buying new homes, who front tens of thousands of dollars in "system development charges" as a part of a home's price – driving up the price of housing and slowing new construction.
Perhaps no urban growth boundary expansion has been more problematic than Damascus. Added in 2002 under older rules that required Metro to use soil quality as the main factor for deciding where to expand the UGB, the only thing rockier than the hills of Damascus was the area's political history. Incorporated as a city to plan its own future in 2004, residents couldn't agree on plans for growth and limited the city's ability to pay for public services. Residents there voted in May to disincorporate the city later this year.
Many areas of the city may never develop.
Metro has repeatedly lowered its expectations for growth in Damascus, and the latest review estimates that about 5,000 homes could be built there, mostly along the city's western edge where Happy Valley could annex areas that were formerly in Damascus.
If the Metro Council could remove parts of the Damascus area from the urban growth boundary, it could replace the removed areas with UGB expansions elsewhere in the region. The concept was first described by the Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development, and was brought up again at Wednesday's meeting by Troutdale Mayor Doug Daoust.
But the Metro Council isn't eager to expand in areas that will face the same planning, funding and governance struggles as Damascus.
Wilsonville has been planning some of its UGB expansion candidates for years, and its leaders say they're ready to build. They say there's enough demand in western Clackamas County for new housing, and enough political and physical infrastructure in place, that homes could be built there relatively quickly and with lower expense to taxpayers.
Without a new system in place, the plans for Wilsonville's expansion proposals are collecting dust on a shelf. Wilsonville's growth proposals also face another significant barrier – the Clackamas County Commission wants to renegotiate its 2010 urban reserves agreement.
County officials want to add the Langdon Farms Golf Club on the French Prairie south of Wilsonville to the urban reserves, which are areas that the Metro Council can use for UGB expansions in the next half century. Wilsonville doesn't want to grow south of the traffic-clogged Boone Bridge, and can't expand on the area it's seeking northeast of town without a reserves agreement in place.
Committee members representing local governments said one of their biggest concerns about the new Metro growth policies – planning for growth before they ask for an expansion – is that planning work could be wasted if expansion doesn't follow.
There were also geographic concerns about the Damascus land bank proposal. Clackamas County Chair John Ludlow shot back at the idea of downgrading the growth outlook in Damascus so that more growth could be planned in Washington County.
"You want to take land from Clackamas County and give it to Washington County?" Ludlow asked.
That prompted Washington County Chair Andy Duyck to remind Ludlow that he has supported that same concept in reverse for the last two years.
"You were OK with going the other way around," Duyck said.
Ludlow has persistently called for land removed from the urban growth boundary and urban reserves in Washington County to be added in Clackamas County, specifically in the French Prairie.
The committee also discussed how to determine whether a city has a local need for a UGB expansion. One key factor looked at was growth rates and affordability – if a city is growing faster than the rest of the region, for example, or if house prices are outpacing other areas. The group also suggested looking at how well UGB expansion candidate areas would help serve the region's "six desired outcomes."
The task force is scheduled to meet again in late July.