News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
The fight over the Pine Meadow Ranch development at the western edge of Sisters has landed in the Oregon Supreme Court.
The court decided February 12, to hear an appeal filed by the Alliance for Responsible Land Use in Deschutes County.
ARLU DeCo., led by anti-growth activists Howard Paine and Bill Boyer, challenged an Oregon Court of Appeals decision which cleared the way to zone approximately 50 acres of Pine Meadow Ranch for standard and high-density residential use.
ARLU DeCo. claims that Deschutes County was wrong to accept PMR Dev Co.'s evidence that the city had reached the required 75 percent level of development according to the city's 1979 boundaries.
The opponents argue that PMR's interpretation of the 1979 size of the city doesn't match the area listed in the city's comprehensive plan, and that the plan's numbers must be used.
"The Sisters comprehensive plan was not followed," Paine said. "You can't come up with some other rationale, numbers, like the developer did in this case."
The state Land Use Board of Appeals and the Oregon Court of Appeals did not challenge the county decision.
PMR is currently working on county applications for its commercial development plans and drawing up its master plan for its residential development. Developer Steve McGhehey said that work will continue.
"We're not going to change our course one bit," McGhehey said.
The Supreme Court hears only a few of the cases that are appealed; the court generally only takes land use cases that have statewide significance.
Paine believes the PMR case has important implications for land use planning.
"If you can't follow the comprehensive plan, you might as well just throw them out, every city and county comp plan in the state," Paine said.
McGhehey believes the court wants to use the appeal to review the precedent-setting case, Clark vs. Jackson County. That case determined that the courts must uphold local interpretations of land use laws unless they are clearly wrong.
McGhehey thinks the court may want to better define what is "clearly wrong."
McGhehey said if the court sends the issue back to the county, PMR will seek an amendment to the comprehensive plan that reflects their survey of the size of the city. McGhehey believes that would mean at worst a delay.
PMR could also be required to make a more thorough comparison with other developable properties.
Paine indicated that ARLU DeCo was not concerned with delaying or halting the development.
"There was no intent to stop the development," Paine said. "It's within the Urban Growth Boundary and it'll be developed at some point. We just want them to follow the comprehensive plan."
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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