METRO POLICY ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING RECORD

November 19, 2003 – 5:00 p.m.

Metro Regional Center, Room 370A&B

Committee Members Present: Herb Brown, Nathalie Darcy, Dave Fuller, Bernie Giusto, Gene Grant, Ed Gronke, Judie Hammerstad, Tom Hughes, Kent Hutchinson, Lisa Naito, Doug Neeley, Martha Schrader

Alternates Present:

Also Present: Hal Bergsma, City of Beaverton; Beverly Bookin, CCA/CREEC; Brian Campbell, Port of Portland; Bob Clay, City of Portland; Danielle Cowan, City of Wilsonville; Kay Durtschi, MTAC; Holly Iburg, Newland Communities; Jim Jacks, City of Tualatin; Stephen Lashbrook, City of Lake Oswego; Karen McKinney, City of Hillsboro

Metro Elected Officials Present: Liaisons – David Bragdon, Council President; Brian Newman, Council District 2; Rod Park, Council District 1. Other: Susan McLain, Council District 4

Metro Staff Present: Kim Bardes, Dick Benner, Dan Cooper, Andy Cotugno, Kate Marx, Lydia Neill, Mary Weber

1.  INTRODUCTIONS

Mayor Tom Hughes, MPAC Chair, called the meeting to order at 5:06 p.m. Those present introduced themselves.

2.  ANNOUNCEMENTS

Chair Hughes advised the committee that the schedule of MPAC meetings for 2004 was available on the table. That schedule is attached and forms part of the record. He also announced that there would be another Agriculture Symposium, “Balancing Agriculture-Urban Land Needs in Washington County,” on Friday, December 12, 2003. Applications for this function were provided and one is attached and forms part of the record.

3.  CITIZEN COMMUNICATIONS

There were none.

4.  CONSENT AGENDA

Minutes from the November 12, 2003 meeting have been deferred until the next meeting.

5.  COUNCIL UPDATE

Council President Bragdon said that the two major land items would be discussed at the meeting, Title 4 and Periodic Review.

8.  PERIODIC REVIEW

Chair Hughes introduced Lydia Neill to discuss Periodic Review. Lydia Neill gave a presentation and reviewed maps. Materials presented are attached and form part of the record.

Doug Neeley asked how many acres had it been scaled down to.

Lydia Neill said it had been scaled down from 68,000 to 28,000 acres.

Doug Neeley asked how much they were currently seeking.

Lydia Neill said that they needed 1,968 net acres.

Ed Gronke pointed out that the area south of Wilsonville and the Willamette River was still on the map.

Lydia Neill said that it was because it continued to meet the factors/criteria.

Andy Cotugno said that this step was the narrowing step and that the selection step would be in the spring. The narrowing step was to identify lands that were appropriate, the selection step would be to consider more criteria and actually select for industrial use. At that point they would have to follow state criteria: exception lands first, farmlands last. They would have to consider the state factors that evaluate on public services, agricultural impacts, and natural resource impacts. The committee could also add factors to consider that represent regional policies.

Judie Hammerstad asked if the criteria was less than 10%, larger than 5-acre parcels, contiguous to the Urban Growth Boundary (UGB), and located within 1 mile of existing industrial zoned lands or 2 miles from an interchange. She asked what would happen if they did both – industrial zoned land and an interchange.

Brian Newman said that he had requested a specific map to represent what if they weighed the criteria equally as opposed to doing either/or for existing zoned lands. He said that it took it from about 28,000 acres to 12,000 acres and it eliminated a lot of exception land. He liked it because it eliminated a lot of land that was hard to imagine for industrial development and focuses on the areas that might be the most appropriate. He said that the Council thought it might be a good filter to put the land through in April when they were closer to making the final decision. At this point, however, it might exclude too much land for the study.

Judie Hammerstad said that current land identified as industrial was more likely to be close to an interchange and that seemed like a more important criteria than rural land with under-developed infrastructure.

Lisa Naito said that a lot of the exception land in eastside was really very productive nursery land. She said that there had been discussion to rezone it as agriculture because it was so vital to the industry. She said she would be very concerned to see that used for industrial land.

Doug Neeley said what do we call agriculture/industrial – would it include both production and added on value in terms of processing. Can production land that was agricultural be protected under the industrial designation? He said it was important to get handle on this and how important ag-industrial was to specific areas in the industry.

Susan McLain said that the timing was important on when it goes from 28,000 to 12,000. The study needed to demonstrate that they had looked at exception land first for the state to be satisfied.

Chair Hughes said that they were really looking at two types of industrial land: high tech land that benefits from the cluster and therefore needed to be near other industry, and warehouse and distribution which benefits from being near interchanges. Data seemed to indicate that demand was more for warehouse and distribution needs.

Council President Bragdon said it was on the Council agenda for December 11^th and therefore they would need action taken on this item at next meeting.

Judie Hammerstad asked for guidance on what they were able/allowed to recommend.

Council President Bragdon said that they were working on the map.

Chair Hughes said that these were policy decisions so they could recommend a policy, and if the Council chose to go with a different policy, it would at least be on record.

Lydia Neill said that they had finished the draft of the 2003 analysis and it was available to planning directors around the region. It was a lengthy and technical document so staff was hoping that planning directors had the opportunity to review before and then comment on at next MTAC meeting. That document would possibly go before MPAC in January 2004.

Doug Neeley said that he was not comfortable with MPAC making a decision one day before it went before Council. He was concerned that an issue might come up and there would be no time to work it out.

Council President Bragdon said it could be delayed until December 18^th.

Lydia Neill said that they were not required to finish by the end of the year, but if they could the timing would be better.

7.  TITLE 4 UPDATE FROM MTAC

Andy Cotugno said that MTAC had an in-depth discussion about Title 4 and regionally significant industrial areas that morning. He said that they still wanted to work on the issue but nonetheless had come up with three different conceptual directions.

Bev Bookin, representing MTAC, gave a presentation on Title 4. Two handouts were passed out and they are attached and form part of the record.

Doug Neeley asked if there were benefits to the jurisdiction in terms of having a regionally significant industrial designation on land.

Andy Cotugno said that they could give a higher funding preference to regionally significant industrial areas and move the rest of the industrial down to the second tier like town centers, light rail stations, and main streets.

Doug Neeley asked if that was the current thinking.

Andy Cotugno said it was only a point of discussion.

Rod Park said that item 2 on the handout was not another layer of regulation.

Bev Bookin said that the RSIAs were a subset of industrial. What they had done in Title 4 was create a subset that imposes some additional regulations. The remaining industrial areas had the existing regulations. There was substantially more restriction than with local zoning codes in regards to industrial. Among those who viewed this from outside the process, the perception was that this was one more barrier or complication to deal with. The good news was that the economy was picking up and the economic development agencies regionally and locally were gaining more interest from companies who were looking for sites. The bad news was that the period for making decisions was much shorter and buyers were looking for reasons to knock sites off the list. Uncertainty of any kind or even minor problems means that sites get knocked off.

Susan McLain asked how much time MTAC took to talk about the risk of having to go back for an LCDC acknowledgement review.

Bev Bookin said that if they could find a way to accomplish the goal in a way that was broadly acceptable she hoped that LCDC would be receptive.

Susan McLain said on the office space issue they would lose ground but retail percentage they would gain ground.

Bev Bookin said that she did not think they would lose ground. She said they had made some changes, although there were some issues that needed to be defined. She said that they needed to allow office space manufacturing.

Susan McLain said that the findings had to prove that they were either gaining or losing ground so that they would come out ahead.

Lisa Naito said that they all come to this with the idea that more protection on land for jobs was needed. Now, however, they were hearing that some of the restrictions on this were counterproductive. Clarity on what the business community wanted was needed. She asked if Metro could designate regionally significant industrial areas without putting additional restrictions on them.

Rod Park said that one of the purposes of the RSI areas was to preserve large lots. He wondered how that was addressed when buyers approached them.

Bev Bookin said that they had not found consensus on whether a 50-acre lot should be held sacred. One concept considered was that master planning for large lots and requiring that there be a mother lot surrounded by smaller lots. She said there was concern that they needed the 50-acre lots but also the flexibility to provide viable spaces for buyers of all sizes. If they did allow this concept, then they had taken away the reason to argue for expansion. That issue was still under discussion, but with the understanding that they would have to go one-way or another, but it could not be both options.

Rod Park said that this could have an impact on the work they were doing with the Alternatives Analysis.

Bev Bookin said that MTAC should consider how it would impact the Alternative Analysis because they don’t want to compromise Task 3.

Nathalie Darcy asked if a company were looking at the regulations on a site of interest would they be concerned with long term versus short-term impacts to their plans?

Chair Hughes said that both long term and short-term effects were of concern. If buyers were not sure about long-term success, they might take a pass on available spots in the area.

Bev Bookin said the Regional Partners were in the process of developing a regional economic development strategy that would have a jobs policy. In a few years time when they revisited periodic review they would have additional information. They still needed to protect the land supply for industrial needs and create more 50-acre lots per the study that had been done.

Judie Hammerstad said that the discussion for months had been that the large 50-acre lots were needed and not to parcelize them. She said she felt like they had not made progress on that issue. If they move the UGB to include another 2000 acres it should be productive acres.

Dave Fuller said that he hoped that they had looked at the smaller jurisdictions and realized that the needs for them were not the same as those for Portland or bigger areas. He said that timing was critical for their areas as they needed to develop new business as fast as they could. It was not good for them to develop one large site and ride through economic highs and lows. They needed more flexibility.

Bev Bookin said that there was a welling up of concern of both private and public jurisdictions. People were sensitive to the one-size fits all jurisdictions mentality. She said that she could not answer question on 50-acre lots. The study was a good study that suggested that they did have a short fall of industrial land. Part of the issue was not only how many companies really needed 50-acres, but also how often had they lost potential buyers because they did not have it available.

Ed Gronke said it was dangerous to spend a lot of time trying to predict what businesses would need 5-10 years down the line because they do not know themselves. He said that businesses looking for sites wanted certainty. The certainty issue needed to be answered quickly and perhaps they should make the best decision that they can and not agonize over it anymore.

Doug Neeley said that making projections for a 20-year period based on the last 5-years was a mistake because there was a lot of variability in terms of demand and need. He said that he thought the study showed that there was a need for fifteen 50-acre parcels.

Andy Cotguno said that was about 500 acres. He said that they had already added 2000 acres of industrial land and they still need another 2000 acres. So the 50-acre parcel was an important issue but it was not the only issue.

Bev Bookin said that a lot of demand is for parcels below 20-acres. Many industrial support facilities were on 5 or 10-acre lots.

Chair Hughes said that they would have a week to review whatever MTAC decided before December 10^th.

6.  BI-STATE COORDINATION COMMITTEE

There were not enough members present to form a quorum and take a vote on this issue.

Andy Cotugno asked for consensus from committee members present and those of them present agreed that it was a good idea.

Judie Hammerstad announced the opening the next day of Lake Oswego’s Town Center.

There being no further business, Chair Hughes adjourned the meeting at 6:06 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,

Kim Bardes

MPAC Coordinator

ATTACHMENTS TO THE RECORD FOR NOVEMBER 19, 2003

The following have been included as part of the official public record: