Testimony in Support of Repealing the 20-year Land Supply Rule

One of the primary forces driving local growth is Oregon's "20-year land supply rule", ORS 197.296. This law requires cities, counties, and metropolitan service districts to maintain a sufficient supply of buildable lands to accommodate estimated housing needs for 20 years in to the future.

Often called the "mandatory growth rule", this law often results in cities growing faster than they might otherwise. When a small or medium sized town experiences a sudden surge in population, (for example, due to the completion of a significant housing development), the short-term but high rate of growth is often used as the basis for projecting artificially high growth rates well into the future.

The resulting large expansion of the city's Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) paves the way for even more development, and the growth cycle continues. This cycle places local governments in the difficult position of having to plan for and fund substantial new infrastructure. Public facilities such as schools, libraries, police and fire stations, water treatment facilities, new roads and capacity increasing projects on existing highways, parks and open spaces and other public service needs must be met. These infrastructure requirements often force local government to either increase its debt burden, increase taxes or both.

Compounding this problem, new infrastructure is often built to handle additional capacity thereby immediately increasing and encouraging additional growth, which the community may not desire.

I believe that allowing a state land supply rule to dictate local growth is contrary to the ability of local citizens to have a voice in how much their town grows, or if it should grow at all. Every community in Oregon has its own unique needs and goals. Every community in Oregon should also have the right, and the ability to play a much greater role in determining its own future.

To that end, I urge the city council to pass a non-binding resolution calling for the amendment of ORS 197.296. The law should be amended to allow, rather than require communities to maintain a 20-year supply of buildable land.

Thank you for your consideration of this request.