April 07, 2007, Page A1
When John Arnett bought his 115 acres in 1968, the tree was knee-high and the previous owner had been running a dairy farm on the land for at least 30 years. Arnett shuttered that operation, started cultivating hay and soon found that little else would grow in the rocky soil.
The Angus beef cows there now are getting their last fill of grass before heavy equipment starts leveling and grading much of the property to make room for a subdivision of 41 upscale homes for retirees with parcels between 1.5 and 5 acres each.
Arnett's property is one of the first subdivisions in the state to break ground after a successful Measure 37 claim.
Though numerous claims have been filed across the state and many have resulted in county and state waivers, very few have started taking bulldozers to the earth. The few that have are mostly single homes on small pieces of land.
Between Deschutes and Jefferson counties, at least three other Measure 37 subdivisions are also poised to start construction in as little as a month, according to an attorney, a consultant and planning officials.
Oregon's Measure 37 initiative, passed by voters in 2004, lets longtime landowners seek money from the state, counties or cities if land use rules had changed since their purchase and restricted what they could do with their property. In most cases, rather than paying claims that could run into millions of dollars, states and counties have exempted the owner from the more restrictive rules.
Arnett's apple tree, just starting to sprout tiny green leaves this week, reminds him of the backbreaking work he and his children put into the land years ago, pulling rocks out of the soil one at a time and stacking them into piles clustered around juniper trees across the property.
"A year from now there should be people out here," Arnett, 80, said from the driver's seat of his GMC Denali sport utility vehicle as he drove across the fields. "One of the great things we have here is the closeness to Redmond."
His three children, now all in their 50s, have long since moved away. He lives in a house with his second wife at the western edge of the property that he plans to keep once the subdivision is built.
A complicated process
Though Arnett's Measure 37 claim has not been fraught with the controversy that some others in the state have been, his project has not been completely without opposition. When he started seeking a waiver about two years ago, he wanted to put 100 homes on the land. That drew some concern from residents at Equestrian Meadows, a large-lot subdivision that borders the north edge of Arnett's property.
So he went back to the drafting table and came up with two other proposals that he said he took to more than 40 neighbors for input. He ultimately agreed to split the land into 5-acre lots along the north edge of the property. Almost all of Arnett's neighbors ended up supporting his plan for a 41-lot subdivision, he said.
Though legal questions remain about whether Measure 37 claims can be transferred from one person to another, it is not as much of an issue for Arnett, since he has not sold the land to developers, said Kristi Weigant, a project manager at C Corp Developers, which is partnering with Arnett to build the subdivision.
Transferability
In August, a judge issued a ruling in Crook County that Measure 37 waivers could not be transferred until land was developed, but did not clearly define what counted as enough development, leaving open a legal gray area. The ruling does not apply to Arnett's property since it is in Deschutes County, but the "transferability" issue has been a hot button for people on both sides of the Measure 37 debate across the state.
Shortly after the passage of Measure 37, Attorney General Hardy Myers issued advice saying that claims should not be transferred, but his opinion was not legally binding and higher courts have not yet resolved the issue.
Deschutes County Planning Director Catherine Morrow cautioned that in Arnett's case, things are not set in stone, even though the County Commission approved his subdivision plan last week. The appeal period hasn't yet passed.
Lots on Arnett's development, which he expects to hit the market in the next few weeks, will sell for between $275,000 and $400,000. Arnett's plans call for adding roads and basic infrastructure, leaving the home-building to whoever buys the lots.
Looking north, some will have clear views of Smith Rock, Mount Jefferson and the Three Sisters that rise to the west. Tentative plans call for preserving two ponds on the property, and a section of about 20 acres will be left as green space with trails, Arnett said.
Approval process
Getting plans approved has been a long process for Arnett and most other property owners who filed claims against counties and the state under Measure 37.
Waivers don't give owners the green light to build; they still have to go through the land use permitting process if they want to develop their land. So even after getting waivers from both the county and the state, owners must go through a detailed planning process if they want to build. For subdivisions, that often includes water and traffic studies and a series of reviews, hearings and appeals.
"You can get a claim or a waiver ... very easily just by proving your date of acquisition of the property," Weigant said. "Going through the land use process and getting a subdivision approval, there are very few in the state."
Arnett's Measure 37 claim is far from the largest in Deschutes County. A review of claims the county has approved found 15 larger than Arnett's, including 10 that were at least 150 acres.
But it will be one of the first in the state to start subdivision construction, according to Deschutes County planning officials and observers on both sides of Measure 37 claims.
Another 40-lot subdivision near Redmond on about 55 acres owned by John Johnson will also break ground in the next month, said Tammy Harty, a consultant working with many property owners who have Measure 37 claims.
In Jefferson County, two subdivisions, including one that is more than 180 acres, may also start construction soon, said Redmond attorney Ed Fitch, who is working with many Measure 37 claimants in Central Oregon. Crook County Planner Cody Vavra said that while no subdivisions have been approved there yet, several are being reviewed and many more are expected as landowners get county and state waivers for their Measure 37 claims.
David Hunnicutt, the president of Oregonians in Action, the group that sponsored Measure 37, could only think of one other subdivision, near McMinnville, that recently broke ground.
A spokesman for 1000 Friends of Oregon, a land use watchdog group that has opposed many Measure 37 projects, said that at least two projects in Clackamas County are also nearing construction.
Other problems
Aside from the neighbor-to-neighbor disputes that have flared up across the state, putting subdivisions in rural areas may cause other problems, some officials say. In Redmond's case, the city's water mains and roads are not designed to accommodate large developments outside of its limits, Public Works Director Chris Doty said.
"We're concerned with Measure 37's ramifications on city infrastructure because it basically focuses intense development in rural areas that come into the city and utilize capacity in our system," Doty said.
He added that Arnett's claim would have a relatively minor impact, but that it highlights the issue nonetheless.
Though he sees himself as an entrepreneur who has bought and sold a number of nursing homes across Central and Eastern Oregon, Arnett doesn't want to be painted as another money-hungry landowner.
Growth is all but natural, he points out: Redmond's population now is about the same as Bend's was when he first moved to the region.
"I don't want people to think, 'Oh, they're tearing up a beautiful old ranch out there in order to build more houses,'" he said.
Original article:
http://www.bendbulletin.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070407/NEWS01/704070346&SearchID=73283345124328