News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
Sisters' boundaries grew overnight Tuesday, March 11, as voters approved bringing 13.6 acres of the Barclay Ranch into the city. Voters also approved a measure that requires voter approval to extend city services to users outside the city.
Barclay Ranch owner Ted Eady proposed the annexation as the first test of a measur
e passed in November that gave voters control of whether properties should be annexed.
He plans to build an inn on part of the land, and part of it would be zoned for light industrial uses.
Eady has offered 6.77 acres that were not part of the annexation for a city park or a site for a new city hall.
Eady campaigned hard for the annexation, canvassing the city door-to-door. The final tally was 175-111, or 60.97 for and 38.6 percent against the annexation.
Eady believes the vote proves that Sisters is not anti-growth, contrary to the impression among the former city council and others that the passage of the annexation measure was a "no-growth" vote.
"That's clearly not the case," Eady said. "For people to say that Sisters is anti-growth, I don't think that's true."
Eady has long advocated a liberal annexation policy for Sisters, encouraging the city to bring in bare land to increase revenues and to give the city control of development.
Virginia Groom of the Committee to Save Sisters was an opponent of the annexation. She took the approval in stride.
"I think it means the annexation policy is working," Groom said.
She said the voters "probably think it (the Barclay Ranch annexation) wouldn't add
congestion to the city, it wouldn't bring more houses into the city and more people -- and it would bring in more room tax. The voters got their chance to vote and that's what they decided to do and that's what it's all about," Groom said.
The voters overwhelmingly approved a measure requiring voter approval to extend city services outside the city. The tally was 178-106 or 62 percent in favor and 36 percent against the measure.
City Councilor Gordon Petrie sees the vote as an indication that "the voters want some control."
Petrie also believes the vote on Barclay Ranch should put to rest the idea that voter control of annexation stops growth.
Petrie thinks the vote went in favor of annexation based on "the promise of increased tax revenues. On the other hand," he said, "what was not gotten across is that growth generally does not pay for itself, even with the increased property tax revenues."
Petrie said he was not particularly disappointed with the outcome.
"My purpose in voting against it, and I did, was to make sure he (Eady) went through all the hoops," Petrie said.
Eady said he plans to file immediately for a zone change on the property to allow him to carry forward his plans. He also told the city council at their Thursday, March 13 meeting that he wants to begin work on the gift of land for a park. The offer would expire if not acted upon within five years.
That idea may run into some opposition from Petrie, who isn't sure that having a park there is a good idea because part of the land is over the Hotel Sisters' drainfield and because it lies near (but not within) the runway approach zone for the Sisters airport.
"Personally I could see that it could be a liability and a detriment," Petrie said. "And additionally, with the present budget mess, I don't know that we could do anything with it in the five-year time period Eady has set," Petrie said.
The city council is set to discuss the donation of the land at an April 8 workshop at city hall
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
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