Bend’s lengthy Urban Growth Boundary expansion process has garnered increased attention recently amidst renewed efforts to satisfy state demands that were not met the first time around. Barring appeals, the UGB could be approved under current timelines no earlier than 2017 or 2018, city officials say.
That’s too late, said Liz Dickson, a land use and water law attorney with Hurley Re, PC in Bend. Dickson would like to see the city get more staff or consultants on board to speed up the process.
“We don’t have a lot of time to mess around with this,” Dickson said. “We’re going to run out of land before they finish this process.”Bend originally sent its first UGB expansion proposal to the Department of Land Conservation and Development in early 2009. The city had planned to bring about 8,500 acres of new land into the UGB, including land that could be used for residential, commercial and industrial development. It would have been the first significant increase in the UGB since the early 1980s, according to the city, and had already been a lengthy process at that point. Two years later, the DLCD remanded the application back to the city with a list of tasks it must complete before gaining approval.
This time around, the amount of land is expected to be smaller. The city must get it right regardless of how long it takes, said Mayor Jim Clinton. Clinton voted against the UGB plan in 2009 before it was submitted to the DLCD.
“It could be done quicker if the city council came up with more people to get on top of it or we could do it in a methodical way,” he said. “Because the perception was that last time it was done too quickly and that was why it got rejected. Now the city is paying the price on delays.”
The city has formed what is being called the Remand Task Force, which consists of City Councilors Jodie Barram, Sally Russell, and Doug Knight along with Planning Commissioners Kevin Keillor and Cliff Walkey.
The group meets with staff the third Monday of each month to hold public meetings, consider staff analysis and ultimately make recommendations to the city council on the UGB process.
“I think we all knew that the state was going to remand parts of the UGB,” Barram said. “We didn’t know that it would take so much work. It’s frustrating that it’s going to take four more years, but if we do this right and have the public’s consent, it will be worth it.”
Among the tasks the city must complete are new plans for water and sewer facilities and completing a transportation analysis for the roads that would service the lands within the UGB. Additionally, the city must complete work on a residential lands needs analysis and create visualizations for future land use, according to Damian Syrnyk, senior planner. Syrnyk and Brian Rankin, principal planner, are the two senior staff working on the UGB expansion process.
“For a while, the attention was off the UGB because things were very slow,” Syrnyk said. “Nobody was lobbying us to get this done. Now, it’s picking up again.”
The city is seeing increasing residential construction and developers are complaining of a lack of developable land within city limits, Syrnyk said. “We’re getting feedback from folks who are stakeholders in this process, saying we need to make this a priority,” he said.
Economic development officials and others in the real estate community are calling for hiring more staff or consultants to work on the UGB process in order to take advantage of increasing demand, Syrnyk said.
“We’re hoping to have a good plan by September so we can say to the council that this is what we can do with additional resources,” he said.
The Remand Task Force will next meet August 19 from 3pm to 5pm at the DeArmond Room at the Deschutes County Building. The meetings are open to the public. For more information, visit http://bendoregon.gov.The Bend UGB Remand Task Force will hold its next meeting on Monday, August 19 at 3pm in the DeArmond Room at the Deschutes Services Building (1300 NW Wall St, 1st Floor). Meeting materials will be posted on the RTF webpage (http://www.bendoregon.gov/index.aspx?page=970) when available.
