Big Look report urges state to ease up on land-use laws
Portland Business Journal
Oregonians are about to get another dose of what does and does not work when it comes to land-use laws.
The Big Look Task Force, the Legislature's on-again, off-again committee to examine planning across the state, is taking its prescription to repair what ails Oregon's land use laws to special interest groups, the public and, if all goes according to plan, to Salem in 2009.
Asked by the 2005 Legislature to review Oregon's land-use program, the 10-member task force is suggesting the state take a more flexible approach to planning: that it recognize that planning needs to reflect local goals and that population growth doesn't always happen according to plan.
The Big Look team also wants Oregon to consider a land-use system that calculates the carbon impact of land-use decisions as well as the impact new rules have on property owners, both positive and negative.
But nothing is set in stone.
Big Look Chair Mike Thorne, a Pendleton rancher and former director of the Port of Portland, said the team will spend the next two months fanning out across the state for face-to-face meetings with groups such as 1000 Friends of Oregon, Oregonians in Action, tribes and other groups with a deep interest in land use reform.
A second round of discussions, with the public, will happen in the fall.
The task force released its 53-page draft plan last month and will likely revise it many times before it sends its final recommendations to Salem for the 2009 Legislature.
The 2005 Legislature created the Big Look Task Force after voters approved Measure 37, requiring government to compensate property owners when new regulations diminished the value of their land, or to waive the new restrictions.
It essentially suspended the task force for nine months while the Measure 49 campaign to modify Measure 37 was under way last year. It restored funding after voters approved Measure 49 last November.
On the Internet: oregonbiglook.org.
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