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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2324 Amends Urban Growth Bound. ORDINANCE NO. 2324 AN ORDINANCE ADOPTING AN AMENDMENT TO THE ASHLAND -COMPREHENSIVE PLAN MAP BY AMENDING THE URBAN GROWTH BOUNDARY IN AN AREA SOUTH AND WEST OF THE CITY CENTER. THE PEOPLE OF THE CITY OF ASHLAND DO ORDAIN AS FOLLOWS: SECTION 1. The Ashland Comprehensive Plan Map as adopted by Ordinance No. 2227 is hereby amended as shown on the map marked Exhibit "A" attached hereto and made a part hereof. The foregoing ordinance was first read on the //p z:.t. day of (la~ , 1984, and duly PASSED and ADOPTED this ,-~Ot:k day of [g~, 1984. ~a~l~MJ~ City Recorder SIGNED and APPROVED this -BId day of ~~, 1984. C()~ --j~ Don Laws Act.ingMClyor ~ f ~ ~ ~ f\ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~\II~ ~ r : ~ i t ~~,.~~ ~ ;}:.. t'" ~ t-~ ~ a ~ ,,',"S;rl"'~~"\.w~'.: . .:-"1':,. t-:.,~..,...j'i<:.'~''''' 1 ht '", ~ ...: ; I...... !~.' "..!II w.~.'. 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'. r ,'\~.\L_i "1'- ,,'" '\ (\~4 C.....l ! \..",AN~'''A \ - , .> /;-' / I / I ./ ,f BEFORE THE PLANNING COMMISSION COUNTY OF JACKSON, STATE OF OREGON IN THE MATTER OF A MINOR ADJUSTMENT ) OF THE CITY OF ASHLAND URBAN GROWTH ) BOUNDARY, COUNTY FILE NUMBER UGBA-13) CITY FILE NUMBER 84-001 ) RECOMMENDATION FOR APPROVAL Recitals: 1) The City of Ashland (City) and County of Jackson (County) are authorized under ORS Chapter 197, to prepare and adopt Comprehensive Plans consistent with Statewide Planning Goals. 2) Statewide Planning Goal 14, Urbanization, requires establishment of urban growth boundaries (UGBs) for each incorporated city through a cooperative process between the City and County. The City of Ashland UGB and related urbanization policies and revision procedures were adopted by the county on July 19, 1978 and subsequently were were revised (File UGBA-7) by Ordinance No. 82-27 after a joint public hearing was held by the Board and City Council on May 20, 1982. 3) Section 11 of the UGB agreement specifies amendment procedures for the UGB and urbanization policies. Final action of an adjustment or revision of the boundary must be based on the six factors specified in Goal 14. 4) The Land Conservation and Development Commission (LCDC) acknowledged the City's comprehensive Plan in October, 1983, with the exception of the area designated Woodland Residential on the City's Comprehensive Plan and Zoning Maps, based on a decision of the Oregon Supreme Court in March, 1982 (Wi11amette University vs. LCDC) to invalidate an amendment to Goal 14 whereby all lands within City limits would have been ;automatical1y considered urbanizable. 5) In response to LCDC's continuance order, the City has proposed excluding certain specific properties within the City limits from the mutually adopted UGB. 6) The City and County Planning Commissions held a properly advertised joint public hearing on April 11, 1984 for the purpose of taking testimony and considering the City's proposed amendment to the UGB. The public hearing was continued to September 12 1984, at which time both commissions adopted a motion recommending County Board of Commissioners and city Council adoption of an ordinance amending the Ashland UGB consistent with the City's recommendation. Ashland UGB Modifications Findings, Page 1 Now, therefore: The Jackson County Planning Commission finds, concludes, and recommends as follows: SECTION 1. FINDINGS 1.1 The Ashland/Jackson County Urban Growth Boundary Agreement defines a major boundary revision. The applicable portion of Section 11 (A) of that agreement reads as follows: "A major revision shall include any boundary change that would necessitate revisions to the intent of City or County Plan goals, policies, text and/or that has widespread and significant impact beyond the immediate area, such as quantitative changes allowing for substantial changes in population or significant increases resource or public facility impacts; qualitative changes in the land use itself, such as conversion of residential to industrial use; or spatial changes that affect large areas or many different ownerships. Any change in urbanization policies is considered a major revision." After consideration of this definition, the Commission finds that: A. The proposal does not necessitate or include revisions to the Goals of the Jackson County Comprehensive Plan. B. The proposal does not have widespread or significant impact beyond the immediate area because: 1. The slope factors contained in the Woodland Residential district of the city's ordinance allow minimum permissible parcel sizes for the area to be from 2.5 to 5 acres. The City proposes to apply 20 acre Woodland Residential zoning to the area. This decrease in allowable density would not have wide- spread or significant impact beyond the immediate area. Such densities would not accommodate substantial changes in popu- lation for the City. 2. Deleting the area in question from the urban growth boundary would recognize the situation of inadequate facilities which presently exist according to the City. The proposal would not cause increased impacts on public facilities, rather it would acknowledge an existing shortfall in the City's ability to provide urban level services, and therefore, it would prevent increased impact on public facilities. 3. The proposal will not provide for commercial or industrial or other non-Woodland Residential use of the property in question. The area will remain designated for uses of a low density large lot residential nature. Therefore, no Ashland UGB Modifications Findings, Page 2 qualitative change of land use designation will occur. C. No change in the urbanization policies of the UGB agreement are considered in the proposal. 1.2 Section llCB) of the agreement defines minor UGB revisions. It reads as follows: "Minor adjustments to an urban growth boundary line may be considered subject to similar procedures used by the City and County in hearing zoning requests. A minor amendment is defined as focusing on specific individual properties and not having significant impact beyond the immediate area of the change." Section llCC) states that: "The Planning Directors for the County and City are responsible for determining whether an amendment is to be considered through a major or a minor amendment process. In the event that the Planning Directors cannot agree, the proposal will be forwarded to the City and County Planning Commissions, and, if necessary, the governing bodies or other appropriate body, until mutual agreement is reached. .. The determination of the Planning Directors may be reversed by a mutual action of both the City and County Planning Commissions or governing bodies." The Planning Directors for the County and City have determined and agree that UGBA-13 is a minor amendment. The Commission concures with that decision for the reasons noted in Section 1.1 and because: A. The proposal focuses on specific individual properties, in Township 39 South, Range 1 West of the Willamette Meridian, identified as tax lots: 200 in Section 8DB; 100, 200, 300, and 400 in section 8DC; 200 in Section l6BC; 300 in Section l6BD; and 100 and 102 in Section l7AB. B. The proposal does not have significant impact beyond the immediate area of the change because: 1. possibilities for development of the specific properties involved will not be significantly altered as a result of the change. 2. There will be no impacts as a result of this change because there will be no substantial change in population of the area, as a result of the proposal, over that which could occur under present plan and zoning designations. Ashland UGB Modifications Findings, Page 3 SECTION 2. FINDINGS PERTAINING TO STATEWIDE PLANNING GOAL liL URBANIZATION 2.1 The subject properties were included in the Ashland UGB pursuant to then current LCDC policy that land within City limits would automatically be considered urbanizable. The Court of Appeals and Oregon Supreme Court (in Willamette University vs. LCDC) ruled this policy to be inconsistent with enabling legislation. Therefore, inclusion of the subject properties within an urban growth boundary must be justified pursuant to the factors of Goal 14. Further, the boundary must be established on the basis of a demonstrated need to accommodate existing or projected housing, economic and population trends. A city is permitted to include lands which are beyond growth needs if it can be shown that the land is committed to urbanization by existing development, and orderly and economically efficient expansion of public facilities can be provided. 2.2 Lands specifically proposed for exclusion from the UGB have not been shown to be urbanizable according to the following reasons: 1) The area in question encompasses a total of 260 acres in the City of Ashland. A map of the tax lots and their sizes is included with these findings, as is a generalized map of the slopes in the area. 2) The area is uniformly steep. The properties lying west of Granite Street generally are all 50% slope or greater, with some small areas of 40% slope or greater. The are to the south of Ashland Street have a mixture of 30%, 40% and 50% slopes, however, they can generally be described as quite steep. 3) Current zoning: The current zoning of all these properties is Woodland Residential. 4) Existing Services: Tax Lot 39 IE 17, 400, owned by the Bureau of Land Management, has access to a dedicated City Street, namely Granite Street. Additionally, tax lots 39 IE l7AB 100 & 102 will have access to City services through the Lithia Park Village Development, should this project be completed. However, both of these parcels are similiar to the remaining study area in that their slopes approach or exceed 50% with soils of granitic structures. All of the other tax lots have no access to a dedicated City street. Tax lot 39 IE l6BD 300, owned by the City of Ashland, has access to the Ashland Loop Road, a Forest Service road. Other City services are not available such as sewage, disposal, City water, or adequate police or fire protection. The portion of the area which is adjacent to Hitt Road would be served by the same water system which is presently under a water moritorium adopted by the Council on May 4, 1984 (Ordinance #2252) and therefore could not have water service extended to it without that problem being solved. Ashland UGB Modifications Findings, Page 4 5) Topography, Soils and Vegetation: As mentioned before, the area is extremely steep. The soils consist of granitic bedrock which has been weathered in place. This is similar to many other locations in the city that the Commission is familiar with, which have a sandy and noncohesive soil layer of varying depths. The vegetation consists of madrone, manzanita and oak in the dryer locations, and pine and fire in the more protected areas where there is greater moisture. The area has been identified as Forest Site Class 5 in a study of the Ashland area by Southern Oregon Regional Services Institute. Similiar areas in the county have been zoned Forest Reserve, 160 acre minimum zone. The areas are subject to a number of natural hazards and have been identified as containing the following hazard types by the City's physical Constraints Ordinance: a) Erosion hazard due to the steep slopes and the noncohesive granite soil. b) Slope stability hazards in areas with slopes of over 40%, which includes nearly all of the area proposed for removal from the Urban Growth Boundary. c) Severe development constraint hazards in areas where slopes exceed 50%. Development in these areas requires a geological study because of the hazard of landslide an debris avalanche failures due to development activities. d) Wildfire hazard due to the steep slopes and the nature of the fire climax vegetation which occurs in the area. 6) The City of Ashland, in October of 1983, received compliance for its Comprehensive Plan with the exception of the area designated Woodland Residential. The LCDC adopted the Staff Report as its Findings on October 7, 1983. 7) The current Comprehensive Plan does not include any of these lands in its inventory of buildable land. As this land was not included in the inventory of buildable lands, and the Plan has been acknowledged by the LCDC, its exclusion will have no effect on the City's housing and economic development. On the other hand, it will provide additional area for wildlife habitat and further implement a number of policies contained in the City's acknowledged Plan, mostly contained in Chapter IV, specifically policies IV-8, IV-12, IV-13, IV-14, IV-IS, IV-17, IV-27, IV-28, IV-29, IV-30, IV-32, IV-34. SECTION 1 COMPLIANCE WITH THE CITY-COUNTY UGB AGREEMENT 3.1 The criteria for approval of a major or minor change are the same. The are as follows: Ashland UGB Modifications Findings, Page 5 a) Demonstrated need for the change to accommodate unpredicted population trends, to satisfy urban housing needs, or to assure adequate employment opportunities. This criteria was oriented to changes in the Urban Growth Boundary which would urbanize additional county lands, and does not contemplate a change such as this, which is to designate lands which are already annexed as being outside the area to which an urban level of services are to be extended. The need for the change is to better identify those lands which can be expected to be developed by the year 2000. b) The orderly and economic provision of key urban/public facilities and services. The change is necessary to identify lands for which the provision of urban services is unlikely, expensive, and difficult given the steep, remote nature of the lands which are proposed for exclusion of the Urban Growth Boundary. The City would not include any plans for extension of services to this area when it is excluded. c) Maximum efficiency of land uses within the current urbanizable areas. The land is in the City Limits by an accident of history. This area would never be included in an Urban Growth Boundary or be annexed by today's standards of planning. Therefore it is most logical that this land be treated in the same manner that a county would treat land in a similar situation. This will guarantee a maximum efficiency of land use by directing public funds and attention toward areas which area expected to fill the City's economic and housing needs. d) Environmental, enerqy, economic, and social consequences. The natural environment would benefit greatly from the exclusion of this land from the Urban Growth Boundary. The environmental problems with the development have been identified in these Findings, in the referenced Sections of the City's Physical Constraints Ordinance, and in the referenced sections of the Comprehensive Plan. The energy impa.ct of the proposal is insignificant in that very little development would take place whether the project is in or out of the Urban Growth Boundary. The current zoning would permit development at a density of about one unit per 5 to 10 acres; the proposed zoning would permit development at about one unit per 20 acres. Much of the land is so remote and difficult to serve that it would not not develop under either scenario. The economic impact is negligible, since the area in question is not an area which would have job impact other than transitory Ashland UGB Modifications Findings, Page 6 construction jobs. The social impact is also negligible as no persons now inhabit the area. e) Compatibility of the proposed chanqe with other elements of the City and County Comprehensive Plans. The compatibility with the City Comprehensive Plan has already been mentioned. Compatibility with the County Comprehensive Plan is not possible because the County Plan does not address areas within the City limits. f) The other Statewide Planning Goals. The LCDC Staff Report best addressed this issue. SECTION ~ CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION 4.1 The specific properties proposed for exclusion from the urban growth boundary have not been shown to be urbanizable according to the factors specified in Goal 14. The City and County therefore conclude, on the basis of the evidence presented both in writing and verbally on this matter, that the minor amendment proposed by the City is consistent with the mutually adopted urban growth boundary agreement, the City and County Comprehensive Plan, and Statewide Planning Goals. The City and County also conclude that it is necessary for it to make a recommendation for Board approval of an ordinance amending the City of Ashland UGB to exclude certain properties as shown on Exhibit Map A to this recommendation. Ashland UGB Modifications Findings, Page 7