Wilsonville Spokesman Online

Urban/rural reserves process done -- for now

Commissioner Charlotte Lehan lauded for her work as a Core 4 member

• By: Patrick Johnson  
• Published: 3/10/2010 3:22:18 PM

Cautiously optimistic.

That’s how many local public officials are looking at last week’s passage of a regional reserves plan that designates which areas will and will not be opened for development in the next 50 years.

Last week saw a flurry of activity, as Clackamas, Multnomah and Washington counties, along with the Metro Council, approved the reserves plan. The plan designates rural areas for protection from urban growth boundary expansion, and urban areas, which are targeted areas for UGB expansion. The plan was largely approved unanimously by counties. Metro councilors, however, were split on the Washington County plan.

The Metro Council approved the plan after a three hour public hearing on a 5-2 vote. Councilors Robert Liberty and Rod Park voted against the resolution to adopt urban and rural reserves.

As passed, the plan will place about 700 acres of land into urban reserves around Wilsonville. This allows the land to be brought inside the UGB in the next 50 years. These parcels fall mostly on the north side of the city.

Overall, 272,118 acres have been designated for rural use and 28,086 acres for urban development in the Metro area.

“I think from Wilsonville’s standpoint, the urban areas they have given us and the rural reserve areas south of the river have accommodated our requests and are pretty much in line with what our planning commission and city council requested,” Wilsonville Mayor Tim Knapp said Friday. “They are defining the Stafford area north of Wilsonville as a large piece of urban reserve and it’s not clear how Metro foresees how that piece becomes urbanized. There are significant groups that want it urban, and significant groups that want it rural. I know that it would be a difficult area for Wilsonville to serve.”

Local advocates for the protection of French Prairie reacted to the passage of the urban rural reserves plan last week much the same as Knapp.

The reserves process, which was started when there was talk of expanding the urban growth boundary into French Prairie south of the Willamette River, now heads to the Land Conservation and Development Commission for approval. Many insiders say there could also be some legal challenges to the process.

“I think it’s going to work out,” said Ben Williams, president of Friends of French Prairie. “Everyone has too much to lose.”

Williams said the process only protected one-tenth of French Prairie that is in Clackamas County, but that the designation of a rural reserve could protect the prime farmland from development for the next five decades.

“There was a well-defined process that was followed very well by Clackamas County,” Williams said. “I am a little biased, but I think the outcome was very much in alignment with what we wanted. It was a good process and they followed it.”

Charbonneau Country Club officials also said they are happy with the outcome.

“I think it’s great for as far as it has gone,” said Tony Holt, chairman of the civic affairs committee and board member of the country club. “It looks like it is going to happen.”
Holt said he agrees with Metro Councilor Carl Hosticka that the Willamette River should be the hard edge of UGB expansion.

“We are very pleased, but cautious about how it is going to end up in the LCDC process,” Holt said.
In Clackamas County, commissioners lauded former Wilsonville mayor and now County Commissioner Charlotte Lehan for her hard work on the Metro Core 4, a group of elected officials that negotiated during the process.

“I have never seen an elected official strive for the high bar of communication as you have for every citizen and property owner to make sure they knew what was going on, where they were in the process and how they could be actively involved,” said commission chair Lynn Peterson. “Whether you may have agreed with the outcome they were trying for, you were open and transparent and allowed them to be heard.”
Commissioner Jim Bernard said that Lehan has done an “outstanding job.”

“This is her defining moment,” Bernard said. “For the county it’s very important that during this defining moment we can hold our head up and say that we applied the factors and followed the law. We have done everything we possibly could to protect foundation farmland, even though it’s not in our county.”

  (log in to rate)