We got some things right. We got some things wrong.
Land use planning: Looking back 40 years.
Forty years ago I was chair of the Jackson County Board of Commissioners. We had just passed an Omnibus Land Use Ordinance that laid out the master plan for meeting high-minded goals for Oregon. Protect Oregon's natural beauty. Shape growth and development so that it avoided inefficient sprawl. Keep the forest and farm land from being made uneconomic or impossible to farm. There was a housing goal, too, but we didn't pay much attention to it. Housing took care of itself. The market system seemed to work.
I had gotten elected as the pro-land-use-planning candidate. My Republican and Libertarian opponents were four-square in opposition to land use planning, saying land use planning was tyranny forced on us by the heavy hand of do-gooders upstate. The Republican candidate was openly endorsed by the local Chamber of Commerce, by realtor groups, by forest and agricultural industry leaders, and everyone in my local Rotary Club of 100 people, except the one other Democrat. Yet I won, notwithstanding the Reagan landslide of 1980. I got elected because was the candidate of "livability," the young un-bossed reformer, and the people aligned against me represented the powerful forces that threatened livability.
We tried to protect forest land. We got something right. Forest fires back in 1980 were nowhere near the threat they are today, but we understood the problem. We attempted to address the now-well-understood "interface" problem of houses built in and next to fire-prone forests. People start fires. People also expect fire-fighters to defend their homes, not "mere trees." It makes fire suppression more difficult. We made forest-adjacent homes harder to build by stopping division of forest property into small parcels designed for homesites.
We tried to protect farm land, and we got something right, but mostly by accident. Back in 1980, commercial agriculture in Southern Oregon consisted of hay and pasture plus pear orchards in 100-acre-plus blocks. Southern Oregon grows excellent pears. Harry and David, the "Fruit of the Month" people, advertise that fact to the world. The county ordinance defined even the most marginal of land as "agriculture" on the premise that someone could grow pears there, even if no one ever had or ever would. The goal was to protect that land from development.
Forty years passed. Pear orchards are being pulled out. Five years ago they were pulled out to plant hemp accommodating the cannabis boom. It also turns out that the very marginal farm land we protected from development is suitable for wine-grapes. Southern Oregon is becoming wine country, not pear country. Some of the wine grape agriculture looks like industrial farming, with large blocks of grapes, but more typical are boutique vineyards. The money in grapes is in the transformation of commodity grapes into branded wine. A successful operation combines tasting rooms, wine clubs, and often an on-site owner who is in a mixed business of wedding venue, event center, wine manufacture, and agriculture. It is the small-business agriculture that we thought would kill real agriculture. Now that is the real agriculture. |
| From: CannabisCulture.com |
8 comments:
This is very interesting and I intend to reread it. As a disabled person who has struggled to keep a roof over my head later in life, I can relate to the issue all too well. (Many disabled people are considered throw-away people in our society. We are a burden to employers if we can still work. We are a burden to taxpayers if we can't work. We are the targets of bullies, criminals and inpatient store clerks. Even the medical profession thinks we are a pain in the neck. Family members can be just as bad. Disabled + poor = useless and unwanted)
Not to trivialize the important issues raised in this blog, but I do find it very sad and depressing that, apparently, more and more farm land is being used to grow pot and grapes for wine. More drug addicts and alcoholics (aka potheads and drunks) are exactly what we don't need in this country. I don't want to live in Intoxication Nation. So glad I never had children.
Thanks
Pear orchards were being torn out long before five years ago.
As far as “it could have been worse,” it’s honestly hard to imagine worse. Oregon is holding near the bottoms on measure after measure.
Today’s RVTimes report on the downtown library is a MUST READ.
The housing issue is secondary to the drug and addiction issues. Whatever the answer is, it is NOT Measure 110.
“The heavy hand of do-gooders upstate” is ravaging the state.
Just a question to one with more background regarding the fires now plaguing us:
Is it possible that select cutting might be more effective than clear cutting in reducing the fuels that feed forest fires?
Actually, the lack of affordable housing is less about land use than it is about simple greed.
We don't build our own houses. Most are built by developers with little to zero interest in anything but profit, certainly not the needs of disadvantaged citizens. They are aided by lenders and and local governments that benefit from well off mortgagees paying property taxes. The result is 4000 square foot monstrosities covering the hills that ring this valley, and little else, excepting the trailer parks displaced by the fire.
A great example is in Corvallis. Landlords have taken student housing out of the market because it's more profitable to do AirBnB, driving up rents.
Are there solutions? Yes, but they are not going to come from the private sector and Republicans will block any initiatives, preferring homelessness and crime, which ultimately costs more than making the investments, excepting bigger jails.
Yes, you are right, community doesn't "pencil out".
I am not a government policy professional or a city planner. But looking at the big picture, our society eliminated almshouses, poor houses and many/most mental hospitals. We also, for the most part, stopped building government "housing projects." New and low-income immigrants and refugees also need a place to live. Baby Boomers are living longer. No one should be surprised that we have a housing and homeless crisis on our hands.
What is happening around Portland is a population spreading into rural communities like Graves, North Plains, Estacada, Troutdale, Camby and Banks were land and and housing prices remain affordable and buildable lots are available. Zoning restrictions are few. Commute time to the urban core are long though. During the pandemic, telecommuting enabled remote work in tech, banking, marketing, finance and yes, even real estate. Clark County in Washington also saw businesses relocate out of Oregon into rural southern Washington.
Here, in Portland, market forces are hollowing out the core. Commercial real estate has not recovered from the exodus with some commercial building completely empty and others running between 40 - 60 percent occupied. That number may change radically as building leases expire not to be renewed. Unaffordable housing is responsible for a majority of the outflow. Land prices are rising in outlying counties and impacting local services like schools, sanitation, police and fire; and of course traffic congestion and disruption of their rural life style.
Influx and relocation forces are impacting whether affordable housing will be built. If we did not have land use planning the sprawl would be uncontrollable and chaotic. As a footnote, apartment and condos are completed and ready for occupancy but unaffordable to median wage earners. Developers thumb their nose at requirements to add affordable units and are willing to pay the penalty when the they provide none. How this will play out is anyones guess. One thing, though, is crystal clear both urban and rural areas in Oregon are not prepared to fill the current housing demand let alone meet the expected near term growth.
Great article, Peter! First, I admit I was a planning commissioner for eight years in JOCO, so I’m not totally against all land use rules. I was sometimes able to convince a majority of commissioners to vote AGAINST the more egregiously foolish rules, and proud of that.
I’m almost 100% in favor of SB360, passed in the late 90s, which directed ODF to develop rules (OARs) that used a carrot and stick approach, in an attempt to convince homeowners to do some fire suppression around their homes. Mostly pretty much common sense things.
The bill has been pretty much ignored, unfortunately. That changed this year when ODF sent out stricter rules. Boy, THAT wasn’t ignored!
The idea of protecting farm and forest land is a fiasco. Zoning on all forestland these days requires a person to own 80+ acres to build a single house (up from 10, up from 25, up from 40, over the last 45 years.
Even worse, most/much of the large parcels of forest zoned land, and farmland, in our area, are not suitable for farming or forestry. Much of our forestland won't grow anything but small white oaks, tick brush and other worthless species. And farmland? You can’t very well farm on crappy soil, especially since there’s generally no irrigation water available.
For whatever reason, anyone with these “Resource” lands in this area cannot even build one house, yet the Willamette Valley, with arguably the best Resource land In Oregon, gets most of the development in the state. Hmm.
As far as protecting forestland, all the agencies can’t accept the fact that their deliberate fire suppression conflagrations are poisoning all of us local citizens. There’s a seemingly obvious solution (replacing fires with mechanized treatment, e.g. Slash Busters and Power Mulchers) but the powers that be refuse to do anything that’s not simply “The way we’ve always done it”
Peter, good points about our zoning of rural lands interfering with housing, not to mention seriously raising housing prices, in rural areas as well as urban.Maybe some genius will think up a good solution. My only suggestion would be considered socialism, I guess: tax multi billionaires to gradually shrink their amazing fortunes, and use that money for housing funds of various sorts. I’m all like, can’t an Uber rich family survive with total wealth of ONLY $1-2 BILLION?
for what it’s worth, my wife and I donated half the land on our five acre lot with one rental to a housing project that will build 12-15 small (but not TINY!,) homes for low income veterans. We’re not billionaires, but if I were able to, I’d donate more land for low income housing. Unfortunately, none of my rural parcels are allowed to have more than one residence on them. And, admittedly, I’m not sure that putting more than one house on most rural parcels is a great idea, mostly due to a questionable supply of water. So far, Grants Pass is virtually immune to water shortage, since that city owns the oldest water rights on the Rogue River and its tributaries.
Apologies and correction!
In my comment today, Graves is not a town in Washington County the name of the town is Gervais.
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