Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Planning Commissioner Wright, I now call the May 14th, 2022 Planning Commission meeting at the Public Safety Building in Newburgh, Oregon is now called to order. Faye may have a roll call, please.

Randy Rickert.

I am here.

Jason Dale.

Here.

Chris Wright. Here. Matthew Mansfield.

Here.

Jose Vallepando.

Here.

Tanya Bitts. Here. And Abby Seitz is absent, and so is Linda Curtis.

Thank you. At this time, I would like to recognize our new commissioner, Tanya Star-Bitts. Welcome. I wanted to very much thank you for stepping up and volunteering for the Planning Commission, and welcome.

Thank you.

Thank you. At this time, are there any public comments on items not on the agenda?

There's no one on Zoom.

Seeing none, we're moving to consent calendar. Do I have a motion to approve Planning Commission meeting minutes of February 12th, 2026?

Madam Chair, I move we approve the meeting minutes from the 2-12-26 Planning Commission meeting.

I second.

Thank you, commissioners. May I have a voice vote? Or may, should we voice? Okay, let's do a voice vote. All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed? Hearing none. 2012-26 Planning Commission meeting minutes as written pass. Thank you. At this time, we'll be going into new business. At this time, may staff give your new business legislative updates receiving reviewing land use bills passed in 2026.

Thank you, Chair Ryan. Good evening, Commissioners. This evening we're providing an update. This is informational. We would also like to hear any feedback or any recommendations that you might have on how we approach code maintenance this year. So we're beginning a little earlier than in the past because the legislature was busy this year, this session, in a short session, and enacted new housing legislation. and some legislation that built on earlier bills that were adopted in 2024, 2025. And sort of the timing on this is challenging because, or challenging to track, I should say, because a number of the bills particularly Senate Bill 1537 that was adopted in 2024 and others, including Senate Bill, I think it was 974 that came later, had different effective dates. So some of these bills were really multifaceted, call them omnibus bills or packages of changes in the law. And the legislature has sort of parsed those out in a way that they have different sections of the bills, have different effective dates, and then even within that, different bills or some bills have sunset dates. So, for example, and this is all background, we're going to go into the content, but I wanted to give you some context for why there are certain bills that have been adopted in recent years that we have not changed our code to address or implement and others that we're now taking up. And so, One example, going back to 2024, Senate Bill 1537 had several components, one of which was a more streamlined path for urban growth boundary amendments, and then that was amended. That process was then amended this year by House Bill 4035, and Senate Bill 1537 was also had very specific changes in how local governments administer the development review process. So there's a section of that bill that creates what we would call code adjustments, but the state titled those mandatory adjustments. We didn't amend our code in 2024 or 2025 to implement those because effectively our code already more or less offers those options for developers. You can apply for a code adjustment for setbacks and a number of other dimensional standards. It doesn't provide all of those adjustments that the bill makes available to development. But when we looked at that and then recognizing that that provision of the bill has an expiration or a sunset date, I think it's 2032 or 30... 33. We thought, well, we're not going to amend our code for something that is going to expire and then later have to amend it. Instead, what we do is we apply that statute directly. If an applicant, if a developer would request that additional flexibility, we would apply the statute directly. So that's something that would happen you know, in the development review process, in the permit process. So it's not a policy change. It's a preemption by the state that we're obliged to implement. So I bring that up because there are some aspects of these bills that we are required to change our code to address and others that are operational without any changes locally. And that's true for bills that have been adopted more recently as well that we'll cover this evening. I think that's part of the high-level overview I wanted to give. There are other bills in this packet, and we included the full summary from the Department of Land Conservation and Development. They publish a summary, a legislative update after every session, and we included all of that, even though much of it doesn't really pertain to Newburgh. There were changes in agricultural zoning laws and things like farm stands and things like that that are of interest to Newberg that don't apply to us. And then there are other changes, as I said, that do not require or changes in state law that do not require changes in local code. An example of one change the legislature adopted this year that we are intending to use, and the council has provided direction, and that's on the one-time urban growth boundary amendment process that Senate Bill 1537 created in 2024, and then this year with House Bill 4035, the legislature added some other features to that. Essentially what they did, or what's relevant to Newburgh, there was a maximum area that cities could automatically bring into their urban growth boundary if the parcel met or the track met certain criteria. And it was up to 100 acres, I think. And then they changed that for residential use. And they changed that this year to clarify what they meant by acres or net acres. They increased it to 150 acres and said that within that, you have to be able to accommodate the housing that's needed, including affordable housing. and open space and parks if that's needed for a new neighborhood which you know typically you want to see some of that as well as any support of commercial uses that would be part of that urban growth boundary amendment so that's an example of a bill that you know they passed and then they refined it this year and we've been tracking it and intending to use it for you know since the original adoption or the council has expressed interest in using it but we were waiting for the legislature to finish their work. And then the agency actually had to make some interpretive statements that they put into the legislative record about what certain terms mean that pertain to us that we had questions about. So there will be more on that process when we begin that this summer, but I wanted you to be aware of it. And it relates to one of the bills that's summarized in this report. Now, if it's all right with you, I'd like to go right into the content that I think does pertain to the Planning Commission's work program and the upcoming code maintenance project that staff and Jeremiah particularly will be leading this summer. So the staff memo, the first page of the staff memo has some information about House Bill 4037, and this was referred to as the Governor's Housing Bill 2026. And really, the key provisions of this bill that I wanted to share with you this evening are summarized here. And what the legislature has been doing with respect to housing over the last several sessions is taking what used to be at least from my experience, it used to be more of a locally driven process where you evaluated your land supply, you forecast housing needs based on population projections and based on other demographic factors, and then you would calculate the land that was needed to accommodate that future growth. And the state rules have always had criteria around how you... what you need to do to accommodate that growth, that you would first look within the urban growth boundary to accommodate it. Then if you didn't have sufficient land, you would look outside the growth boundary. And then there's a whole rubric for what types of lands or non-resourced lands could be considered. Over the last several years, the legislature and the state agencies have made the process much more prescriptive. So the housing needs analysis that we have done over the decades has become much more formulaic. And in fact, the numbers will be given to us in this next round of preparing a housing needs analysis on the number of units that we are expected to accommodate at different sort of affordability or income strata And anyway, all of that is to say that the state, the legislature, and the agencies have also really been focusing on not only the planning process and how we do that macro level planning, but how the permitting process works locally. I have to say, this is not my favorite part of the job because I'm, my, my bias as a planner, as a community planner is that I'd like to see communities articulate their vision with input from, you know, from the public. And then it's a sort of a bottom up and we, we set goals and then we work within the state framework, state, state framework to create a vision and, you know, plan for the future, write our codes to implement the community plan. Well, the state has sort of turned that on its head. I think it's fair to say I'm not grandstanding. It's true. And we've seen over the last several sessions much more prescription on what our codes can regulate or cannot regulate and how we conduct our development review process and when we're allowed to engage the public when hearings are permitted when they're not and so all that is to say that this housing omnibus bill has taken another step in that direction and they've well they've done a couple of things one they're over the last decade there's been explicit policy direction and state rules that say when we regulate housing development land residential land use that our codes must be clear and objective that our standards approval criteria and the permit process itself must be clearly you know understandable to people and objective so that, you know, you look at a plan and you can objectively check a box essentially that it meets these standards, setbacks, height, lot coverage, architectural standards, the extent that, you know, the city has that. And now they've built on that to say that, okay, now that all of our communities presumably have clear and objective standards for housing, you When we ask the public to engage in that process, what is it that we're asking people to respond to if there's very little to any discretion involved in the decision making? And you perhaps have experienced this, you know, when we present applications to the commission and you ask, well, what is our span of control here? What are the, where's our discretion here? needed, or how do we make the decision on it, or is it all prescribed? And the state is, in the legislation, the presumption is that, okay, you have clear and objective standards, so sort of the utility of having public input on those decisions is diminished. And I'm not making their argument for them. I'm just saying that I think this is the thought process that now, therefore, cities and counties can streamline their process and reduce the timeline for development review and permitting. we should have more predictable outcomes and it should take less time and at less expense for applicants to get through that process. So that's the theory and the way that they're operationalizing that in statute and in our codes is sort of articulated here that when we have housing applications and those would be a site design review application for a multifamily project, a new subdivision, a partition that's creating you know, buildable lots for housing, building permits, which have always been a ministerial permit, clear and objective, that now we're required to, if we do provide public notice on those, you know, type two or type three applications, that the notification must be not more than 100 feet, which it used to be that that was the minimum standard and that in statute cities could choose to notify a broader area, which we do, we notify 500 feet, but other jurisdictions have opted to notify different areas like some cities today only notify 100 feet, others are 200 or 300 feet. So this is a change for Newburgh that we would be obliged for developments that are less than 20 dwelling units If we do continue to provide notice, it would be limited to 100 feet. Now, that's the legal notice. That's not to say that the city could not or should not provide information to the community about what's happening in their town. And when we have permits and development applications, we can, you know, that's one of the things that we're looking for your feedback on is if we're restricted and how widely we send out legal notices, is there other Are there other ways that you would like the city to keep the community informed? But before we get to that question, there's more. Not only are we limited in how widely we send legal notices, but we are not to conduct public hearings on applications for housing. Those applications that are going through a clear and objective process and only the applicant may appeal the decision. So they've essentially taken your commission and the city council out of that decision-making process on housing, which, you know, if I'm a community member and I disagree with the decision, I think the city erred in some way. You know, now I'm not going to my local representatives. I'm appealing it to the state land use board of appeals or circuit court, depending on, you know, the... the lawsuit so uh obviously that concern that concerns all of us uh but we're you know we have to we have to navigate through this this new process um we do have some some types of or in some zones housing is uh allowed, but not permitted outright. So you might recall, I think it was the West Branch Apartments on the east side of Springbrook across from the drive-in that came before the Planning Commission for a public hearing. And the reason that it did was that it was in a commercial zone. So the use was only allowed conditionally as a conditional use. So that is not a clear and objective process. And so as we're going through and looking at what we need to do with our code, one of the questions or one of the things that we need to verify with the state is now, does that mean that we need to change our code to make housing a permitted outright use in those commercial zones or If not, then we're going to continue to operate as we have been conducting public hearings on those applications. So I'll stop there because that's a big chunk of what we're being asked to do. I should mention, there are some exceptions. And I need to make a correction here because one of the exceptions is for historic landmarks. So if you're, for example, remodeling a house that's on the historic landmarks list and maybe partitioning it inside, creating apartments in an older house or commercial structures being remodeled for apartments, that would not be subject to these rules. So we would continue to use our historic preservation commission public hearing process for that. The correction I need to make though is that I mistakenly, I also referenced other goal five resources, including wetlands and stream corridors. And in fact, we are required to have a clear and objective process for development in those areas as well. So that would not take those applications out of the loop or out of the the process that's described here, unless the applicant was applying for a variance. And I think that the same is true for any of these housing applications. If they're applying for a variance, then it would go to a public hearing, right? So I'll stop there. And if you have any questions or any comments or feedback, or Jeremiah, if you have anything to add that I've overlooked on this one. It's a tricky one.

We're just being noticed on this. We're not voting on anything.

No, not voting. It's informational. When you see this again, it'll be in a draft ordinance form, but we will also be recommending or seeking your direction on, all right, if we're not providing these legal notices anymore or we're limiting the area that we notify, Are there other types of outreach or information that you would like the city to provide to the community when we have a new subdivision or an apartment project?

Yeah. Well, I guess a question with this going in place, is there going to be a... I guess what... what extra work does that put on our city to redirect citizens who are concerned about things and want to appeal them that can no longer go through city council or the planning commission, but have to go all the way up to the state. Are we going to provide resources to help streamline, streamline their, you know, uh, concerns that they want to address. So we figured out how to do that.

Yeah. Uh, That's a good question. So I think on the sort of legal aid side, I don't know. I don't, you know, we haven't had a conversation with the city attorney or council on that, but it's a good question. We should Typically, the city does not take a stance or provide resources to any party in a lawsuit.

And by resources, I just mean I'm thinking of a concerned citizen who shows up and goes, okay, I didn't read all of the current laws. I have an issue with what's going on. I'm going to go to the city. And I would hate for... people of our town to go to the city and just be told, oh, we can't do anything about it anymore. See ya. But instead be like, oh, you're asking for this. That used to be done via the city council. This is the new pathway.

That's absolutely right. So there's a customer service dimension to this too. So we anticipate that when this goes into effect on July 1st, that we will be getting more phone calls and there will be more social media and there will be people appearing at perhaps this meeting and council meetings wanting to say something about it. So we will be looking at, you know, standing up a new web page, having information about what it is and why and what the source of this is. And we do have you know, our online permitting system, which will continue to have information about, you know, these applications online. But we're just beginning to sort of explore or brainstorm. And I would open up the conversation to really everyone here. If you have any thoughts, Jeremiah or Faye, any thoughts about, not to put anyone on the spot.

I think, too, what's going to come up is because only the applicant can appeal online. they're going to run into issues even trying to go to Luba if they were to appeal it. Not say they couldn't sue to try and stop it, but I think it'd be extremely difficult based on the new legislation without contacting our legislature representative to... Yeah, I think what might be an unintended consequence

outcome of this is that other states, most other states, I'm not aware of many others that have a land use court. Oregon has the Land Use Court of Appeals, which is a court that's specifically for development or land use. And so what happens when someone's contesting a permit decision. Today, if it has gone through a land use process like our Type 2 or Type 3 process, there's a pathway that's laid out in the code and in state statutes for land How that works, you start at the planning commission or hearings officer, depending on the jurisdiction, and then it can be elevated from there to the council or onto LUBA. But for other types of permits, like building permits or erosion sediment control permits that are not land use, it doesn't have the same pathway. So someone who feels that they've been harmed or it's a tort claim or they go to circuit court, and try to say that the city didn't follow the Administrative Procedures Act or something like that. So people may attempt to sue each other. It's just not going to be the same process that we're familiar with.

Well, and even potentially directing them to, I guess my concern is citizen not understanding what the change is and why and how that they can voice their discontent with that change. I've seen a lot of, both here in the planning commission and at our city council meetings, a lot of concerned citizens who have valid concerns but are bringing it to the wrong table, right? Oh, we as a planning commission can't address X, Y, or Z issue even though maybe a layman would think, That we could, right? And so it seems to me, especially with this coming through and what I've already seen on a number of issues that a big customer service aspect, as you say, would be to be prepared to answer those questions in a way that doesn't just say, well, we can't do anything about it. Here's why we can't do anything about it. But also directing, if we understand your concern correctly, concerned citizen, you would like to address that you think this is wrong, well, the best way to do that would be to whatever it is to address the state legislator that put this through.

Yeah, I think that's right. We will be doing a lot more public education around how the state legislature works and also in our government affairs work at the city to the extent that we do government affairs, tracking bills at the legislature, contributing our... input and perspective through the league of Oregon cities. I'm on the league of Oregon cities, housing land use and community development policy committee. So right now we're, we're formulating a rec recommendations that will go to their board for, you know, what the legislative agenda is for, for cities for the league of Oregon cities next year. And, and this is right. This is like front and center. And it always is, you know, home, home rule authority. And also just, you know, evaluating all the policy changes that have been put in place over the past, before you adopt any more, like let's do some, you know, evaluation and see what's working, what isn't working, what's having these unintended consequences, you know, where are the pain points for communities, people, you know, more people will be calling us, calling staff, calling council members with questions and concerns and wanting to know how to voice those. I think it sounds like we're on the same page with that. OK, well, we'll continue. And there is some commentary in the staff memo about other ways that we keep the community informed. And this is a good conversation. I'll just, going onto the second page of the memo, section 26 of the bill addressed one of the questions that hasn't really been an issue with Newburgh, but in some communities that have a larger master plan developments that have both commercial and residential components to those, there was some issue with, affordable housing on lands that are not zoned for residential use. And basically they had to resolve like how much commercial land within those areas can be developed with housing. And it's just in here for information, but we don't have to amend our code for that. The next one is relevant to Newburgh and it has to do with middle housing land divisions. And we have different expiration dates in our code for different types of applications, and we've tried to align those. And we have, in fact, aligned most of those recently with the code maintenance work. But there's sort of this question of when, and I might look to Jeremiah to sort of give an example of this, but we have, it's now possible to apply for middle housing development, for example, a cottage cluster development. and simultaneously apply for the middle housing land division or some partitions or lot line adjustments. And it can become sort of confusing at times in terms of when you have multiple permits for the same site and essentially the same project with different expiration dates, how do you manage that? So any thoughts on that Jeremiah? I think we're managing it, but apparently other communities are having a hard time.

Yeah, and we haven't run into this yet. There's a couple of projects that went through before This happened that they're submitting simultaneous applications for whether it's, and the legislature actually clarified this, I want to say it was 974. I could be wrong, but now you can simultaneously submit like a subdivision and a middle housing land division at the same time, where there's different timelines of when the middle housing would expire versus the actual subdivision portion. And typically the subdivision has to come first to create land. What would be known as what's called the parent lot for that middle housing where the duplex or triplex or quadplex is going. And so just trying to make sure that all those timelines and expirations fall in the same timeline so that it's clear that, hey, this is all together as one package versus two. hey, your subdivision expires in two years, your middle housing's in three years, and design review for your amenity buildings one year, for example, just making sure that they're all aligned. And I think we did do some of that maintenance last year when we cleaned up some of that. I will probably see a little bit more coming this year to make sure that it's all aligned to where if there's simultaneous, it defaults to that highest date.

Yeah, and so it hasn't been a problem for us, but I think it'll help having that clarified in our code. The next page, page three, goes over a bill from last year's legislative session, 2138. And as I was describing earlier, this is one of those bills that has like a delayed fuse or a later effective date for several of the sections of the bill. And so as you can see here, the only one that is already effective really is the first one on middle housing land divisions. And it removed the noticing and local appeals process for middle housing land divisions and expedited land division. So that's already in effect. And now as we've shared with you, they're adding other types of housing to that same process. Same type of change. The other changes here go into effect January 27. And I'm not sure, we haven't quite determined which of these are going to be incorporated into the code and which ones wouldn't require it. Go ahead.

I think the single room occupancy, you'll see that. And I tell people, think of it like a dorm where you have shared kitchen space or shared living space, but you have your own separate bedroom and bathroom. That's coming and we'll have to get updated into our code. So you'll see some more work on that this year to be an effect for next year.

That might be the only one that we actually need to take some action on, I think, on this list. The one that I would point out that I think is significant that doesn't, it's not regulating the city, but it's regulating essentially homeowners associations and CC&Rs. The last bullet on that page, it voids all recorded covenants that prohibit middle housing. and manufactured housing that would otherwise be allowed by zoning. So you might recall when the House Bill 2001 was adopted, putting in place the middle housing statutes and all of the cities changed their codes to allow middle housing. There was this protection, I guess you could call it for lack of a better word, for existing plan developments and their covenants, their CC&Rs, if they didn't allow a duplex or additional units on a lot, they were able to enforce that. The legislature has now preempted that as well so that if you live in one of those neighborhoods or one of those developments, that's something that will change what can happen next door.

A question on page three with the middle housing allowed where an ADU is allowed. Do I understand that? So if any circumstance where Newberg would normally allow an ADU, to allow an ADU means you're also allowing up to a middle housing style building to be constructed?

Yeah, do you want to talk about that?

Yeah, we're still wrapping our heads around this one. But basically what my understanding of it is, is when somebody does a middle housing land division and you have, say, a quadplex and you have four child lots, you can now put an accessory dwelling unit on one of those child lots along with the unit of the quadplex or whatever middle housing it is.

That's right, because we allow detached forms of middle housing, which is kind of a misnomer.

It sounds like the reverse of what it's saying, though, because it's not saying if you have a middle house, middle housing can have ADUs. It's saying middle housing can be allowed on lots with ADUs. So what it sounds to me like is if I've got a property and I get permission from Newburgh, I'm aligning with the code to put in an ADU, instead of that being a traditional ADU size, I can put in a middle house criteria of dwelling. Because it says middle housing and middle housing land divisions to be allowed on lots with accessory dwelling units.

Yeah. And this might just be a function of my shorthand. Okay.

This is not the bill language. Oh, okay. Got it. Okay. That's a good question. We should take a closer look.

Yeah. We're still wrapping our heads around this. I'll say that first. Um, I think there's two separate provisions. So I think, um, Commissioner Mansfield, what you're talking about is where if there was an existing single family house and an ADU on the property and then say they want to do a detached quadplex, now that single family house and ADU counts as just one unit of that quadplex. Oh, I see. Yeah. So, and then there's, I believe another provision in code that we were just recently looking at that talks about what I was saying, where you could add an accessory dwelling unit now to a middle housing lot. Well, so there's, there's another distinction there. The housing legislation gets more complicated every year. The legislature updates it. But yeah, Basically, when you apply for an ADU, it can be either considered ADU or a duplex. What rules apply depends on what you choose. And then if you're looking to do a middle housing land division, you're going to have to do separate water and sewer lines. But there's nothing currently that prevents doing either or.

The trade-off is on. The ADU is limited in floor area and the duplex unit of course is not, but duplex units have to have individual connections to city services where the ADU does not.

And also on page three, the where ADA accessible or affordable, that line, if I'm understanding that correctly, as long as you make your, so if it's in like an R1 zoning that allows up to triplexes, right? And I decided to, I'm doing a triplex in R1, but then I decided to make at least one of the dwellings ADA accessible. Now it can become a quadplex in an R1 because one of them is ADA accessible. Is that how that works? So you can jump the housing requirement by making some of the units accessible?

Yeah, we haven't.

I can probably talk to this. But you're saying yes, mostly. So if you were to do, let's say, a triplex, and a triplex, your minimum lot size is 7,000 square feet. What a quadplex requires more. This, I believe, can get you around that requirement. If you provide either the affordable unit or the type A accessible unit, then you can do that additional unit.

That circumvents the zoning, right? So I'm thinking triplex to quadplex is a zone jump, right? R1 to R2.

They're both permitted. They're both forms of middle housing that are allowed in that zone. There are minimum lot size requirements for each zone. I think what it does is it gets you, so for example, if you need to have a minimum of 7,000 square feet for a quadplex and you create one type A accessible unit within that quadplex configuration, then you can get an additional unit. You could get five units on that 7,000 square foot lot. So track.

Yes, but I guess sorry the heart of the question is, can I use it to jump the zone, so at what point does our one what level of housing is our one no longer. uh or what defines r2 versus r1 and can i do one by by by one dwelling unit do you get what i'm saying so if you know it what jumps to middle housing oh it was going to be middle housing but now that i put an ada accessible dwelling unit now i can get one more dwelling unit on there which jumps me out of middle housing into an apartment complex or five units right so i think you know

I could probably take this one. So if you... Middle housing is allowed in any zone. What the real limitation on it, for the most part, is the lot size. So when you go from like R1, which requires 7,000, that's our low-density residential, and then you go to an R2, which requires like 5,000. Sorry, I'm trying off the top of my head. But requires like 5,000 for a quadplex. So it's still allowed in the zones. You're not really changing the zone. It's just the lot size that... That changed. And then when you get more than four units outside of this, in most cases, you're pushing the multifamily or a cottage cluster.

Your point is now you're no longer middle housing. You're in a multifamily use, and that's not permitted in R1.

Yes. So can you use this to get a non-R1 permitted multifamily housing unit put in if you have enough square footage? into an area that normally wouldn't allow it, not based on square footage, but based off of zone.

I don't think you can. I think so with like a cottage cluster, the statute or the rules limit that to eight cottages in a cottage cluster, but you could use this to get additional units. So you could have a 10-unit cottage cluster, but you couldn't have a five-unit fourplex, right? It would be... You could get...

I've read, not the way I read the bill, but maybe.

Okay. Well, so obviously we don't know and we need to, we need to find out, but it's clear to me that you, that you can, you can add units onto what, what would otherwise be limited by the zone or by the minimum lot size for the type of middle housing that you're building.

Yeah.

To get those bonus units. Right.

Commissioner Wright, did you guys say that ADUs do not have to have their own water sewer?

They don't have to be individually metered? Like a duplex, each unit of the duplex would have to have its own water meter, for example, and its own sewer lateral?

Thank you.

Yep. Other questions about House Bill 2138? Okay, so page four, there were other changes adopted in House Bill 2138 that require rulemaking by the state. And I know those, of course, were not prepared to amend our code or propose changes until the state concludes that process. So these are those elements that require state rulemaking. And as you can see, really the intent here is that they're trying to dial in on removing regulatory barriers to housing. I think that's probably the simplest way to put it. The third point on the footprint for a cottage unit, this had been defined in state rules that cottages were limited to not more than 900 square feet of footprint for the dwelling. And then the legislature adopted state rules They adopted new legislation that struck that 900 square foot footprint and replaced it with small footprint. So they're asking us to be clear and objective, and then they do that.

I will say, if you want to, you can follow the rulemaking, and DLCD has a rulemaking committee. If you kind of want to follow along with that, just as of right now, last I have heard, the

supposed language based on 2138 and this bill is they're looking I think around 1400 square feet yeah so so it's all moving in the direction of more flexibility and reducing barriers to housing okay moving on senate bill 974 now this is an older bill from 2021 and I think the first one here, Section 8, prohibited the application of design standards to residential developments of 20 or more units. And this doesn't affect setbacks, lot coverage, floor area, height. As I read it, it's more about architectural details and appearance. of the structure. It doesn't limit other standards relating to health and safety, building codes, engineering standards, environmental protections, or historic landmarks. We haven't had anyone invoke this or come to us with an application and say that we think that your code is contrary to this and we're asking you to you know, waive certain requirements. So I don't know what effect it actually has on Newburgh. I suppose, you know, we'll review the code as we're going through this and see if there's anything that stands out. But I think, of course, if we were asked to apply the statute and we found that it was consistent with that, we would do so. Section 3 is effective July 1st this year. And this is sort of along the same lines as what I was talking about earlier with reducing noticing and changing the process for development. But this is relating to rezonings, planned unit developments, and variances. And what it says, and contradicts what I said earlier about hearings, is that the initial decision on these applications must be made without a hearing. However, we can provide a hearing on appeal. So if the applicant or any party, any neighbor is not satisfied with the decision that staff makes on a rezoning, a planned unit development, or a variance, then they can appeal that to the Planning Commission. So you might ask, and I ask the same thing, what business does staff have making decisions on rezonings? It's not something that we ordinarily do. It's a policy decision. Even for a smaller site, it's a quasi-judicial application, but it's consequential for the community or the neighborhood. So it's not something that I'm particularly comfortable with. So I think if we do receive rezoning applications, Of course, we'll apply the statute and we'll follow the law. And we're not permitted to refer the application to the planning commission or to ask you to review it. But we'll be scrutinizing those. And the criteria are somewhat subjective for a rezone. We have to apply the policies from the comprehensive plan and so forth and state planning rules. And so if there's any element of that that appears to not be consistent with those policies, then we may just have to deny it. And then, of course, the applicant would be able to appeal that to the Planning Commission. Any questions about that one or anything more that you'd like us to prepare when we bring this to you for an amendment?

Just a simple question. On Senate Bill 974, where there does not limit building height, Has there ever been anybody wanting to go more than three floors here? And if you go more than three floors, do you have to have an elevator?

Oh, so the provision, the Section 8, I think what it's saying is that it doesn't restrict the city's ability to limit height. So it's not changing our controls around height. But if your question is, has anyone asked to increase height? Not under this provision, no.

Any experience with them?

I should mention, it's more of a building code thing, but when you get above the three stories, you start running into fire. Not just elevator, but fire access issues, including aerial access, which TVFR does not have locally here in Newburgh. So they... will typically require either residential fire sprinklers or other means of access to access the roof. So, yes, when you get above three stories, maybe not a planning per se adjustment, but they'll run into other issues besides just planning.

Those buildings are, you know, if it's multifamily, it's commercial building code, and they're going to have to sprinkler that.

Thank you. Yeah.

OK, so we talked about 974. The last item here is state rule making around coordinating with federally recognized tribes. So when we send out referrals for comments on a land use application or notify agencies when we've made a decision, we don't notify tribes. It's not something that local governments have been required to do in the past. And local governments typically don't have a relationship, an intergovernmental relationship with tribes in the way that the federal government does or state agencies might in some ways. In other states like Washington State, where they have an Environmental Protection Act or Environmental Policy Act, tribes are routinely notified and and consulted are part of that process. So I think Oregon Land Conservation Development Commission is wanting to bring that process at the local level, which we have no concern with that. We're happy to do that. And we will be bringing a code amendment to the Planning Commission so that we can formalize that and that we have a process to follow there. It doesn't really change how we review applications. Tribes would have an opportunity to comment. There's already federal protections on archaeological resources, so this in some ways could help with customer service and help with, you know, people with their projects so that if there are areas that are known to be sensitive or that could have, you know, are known to have artifacts perhaps, there would be a communication channel there that doesn't formally exist today. So we think that's a good thing. Yeah, any questions or thoughts around that?

It concur, it's a good thing.

Has there been any developments in the past with tribes here in Newburgh? I mean, I know Yamhill County has the Grand Ronde and maybe some other communities, but is there any directly connected to Newburgh?

We actually are required by the rules to consult. There's a state agency, a state department that is the clearinghouse for all of that information and that the, you know, the federal, federally recognized tribes, the status of different tribes can change. So we want to make sure we're contacting the right, you know, the right tribes. And yeah, do you have any?

Yeah, so as part of that rulemaking, I believe it's the Commission on Indian Services, they're working on it right now. They've reached out to all the tribes, and they are supposed to give each city and county a list of tribes that want to be notified as part of this process.

That's the agency that I was referring to that we're expected to work with, and we will. Yeah, and that concludes the... the short but intensive 2026 legislative session as it pertains to the land use in the city of Newburgh.

Thank you, Steph. I appreciate your time and effort in this. And boy, if you got some work ahead of you guys. And at this time, we will hear From staff about review planning commission up to updated guidelines that are supplemental to the Newburgh City Council board committee commission guidelines that were adopted by the City Council on October 20th 2025.

And they will be taking this one.

All right, so I sent everybody the planning commission participation guidelines. What I did was I took the ones that were existing and I cleaned up some verbiage on the ones that pertain and then I indicated which sections are to be referred to by the, to the new city council, adopted city council boards, committees and commissions guidelines. So I don't know if everybody was able to take a peek at that. What I could do is just go over basically which sections are staying and whatnot, because we can keep the ones that pertain specifically to the... planning commission and um i did with the ones that were i clean up the verbiage to kind of to make it sure it had the current codes that referred to and the current uh way we do things like with the student commissioner and stuff like that but um and then the other items are just we have to refer to the new guidelines. So did everybody take a look? Do you guys have any questions? Do you want me to go through it more specifically?

I definitely have questions and comments, but other commissioners?

Okay, we'll go for it.

Do you want me to go down to just what my questions are? Okay. On page 1, Newberg Planning Commission Guidelines, Rule 2.2 Quorum, if you go to page 1 of 14 or 61 and 62 of this document and you compare it to the Refer to Chapter 1, General Governance of the Newberg City Council Board and Commission Committee Guidelines. In there, Okay. This may be a conflict of chapter one, general governance when it comes to quorum. Number two, the members of city council or of council are the city's counselors or mayor. The members of the standing committee are defined as at their creation, 50% plus one of the members of the council or a standing committee shall constitute a quorum. Vacancies in office do not count towards determining a quorum. And here is the issue. In the event a quorum is not present, the members of the governing body present shall adjourn the meeting or a smaller number may meet and compel attendance of absent members as outlined in Rule 2D. When a quorum is not present at the time set for a meeting or when a quorum has been present, And a meeting has been commenced, but a quorum is no longer present. Any member can otherwise. Some of these are not in alignment with what our guidelines are pertaining to city council.

Yes, I do realize that. So you have to go with what's generic and more for just the commissions and committees. And so with that, I agree it's kind of difficult because sometimes it pertains, it speaks towards the city council a lot. And you kind of have to weed out what is for the commissions and committees.

so uh my concern would be especially um new commissioners i found three different documents pertaining to guidelines um newberg city council document our document and then the city council board committee and commission documents now you've got everybody balancing between

The one that was passed in October 2025 takes precedence over the city council board and the other one that you mentioned. So we can just completely not have any planning commission guidelines and just go straight off of what is in the community commissions guidelines that was passed in October. Or we can kind of it would be what you were referring to. It'd be two, but it would be where we can still have more specific language towards specifically the planning commission.

Um, yeah, the planning commission would be limited to, in the event of a quorum is not present the member of the governing body presidential adjourn the meeting. And that would apply to our commission only. And I understand that I understand that we're to weed through this, but it's a lot of document to weed through. Um, these are a lot to weed through every single section for yours. Is it possible to take out lines and just instead of inserting like see instead of inserting refer to chapter one? Can you specifically state chapter one planning commission?

I could do that. I just, for this time around, I had to make it easy for everybody to know which ones the new, the committee commissions and guidelines takes precedence over the ones that were existing planning commission guidelines. That's why I just said referred to because it was just, you know, it was, was definitely is no longer ours. I could do it that way.

Because originally, I thought we agreed as a commission to go with the Newberg Planning Commission guidelines and elevate those ones that were out of line.

Well, they would just it it It's not that you would have your own guidelines. You would fall back to the ones that were established in October 2025. So those supersede any of the Planning Commission ones. That is not specific to the Planning Commission.

Right. So I think what I'm hearing is that if we could, would it be possible to incorporate the general the city council boards and commission guidelines into the planning commission document and just have one one document that maintains the procedures that are unique to the planning commission and also where the two are in conflict it incorporates the city council so it's really just one document that you're looking for i think so Or is there more to it?

Well, more to it. Yes, I would like to see it on one document so we don't have to go to different areas of our code to look up another thing. And hopefully commissioners will know which belong to their commission.

All other commissions are going off of, I think the planning commission is the only one that's doing their own guidelines. Everybody else is just going off of the ones that were passed in October. Thank you.

Sorry, our main discrepancy that we voted on was that had to do with voting, correct? What was the...

No, there wasn't really any discrepancy. It's just, it was, it just, there was a change. And so we were just going off of our guidelines, which according to our Rachel, our city recorder, they have to complement the city guidelines. They're not a standalone separate anymore.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. But there was one area when we were voting last was, did we want to move it to match the city council guidelines? Or we could keep it the way it was. We voted to keep it the way it was. And now I'm blanking on.

Yeah, that was where you could have a person leave the meeting. Yeah.

How do they recuse themselves?

Yeah. That one and a removal of any persons or for violation of rules. And that's still in there.

Just to throw out there, can we put something in the planning commission rules where it has different text or italics or something that's from the existing city council rules, anything different, your additional planning commission rules?

I could do it that way. If it would help with everybody where it has the, where I said the referred to, we could put the specific verbiage that it is from the, from the city council boarding committees. The only thing is if when they change those, then these that are going to be adopted by, because we have it to where it has to be adopted by resolution would have to change also.

I think what you're suggesting, Jeremiah, if you just had those excerpts copied into the documents, you just have one document to refer to, and I think you suggested putting it in italics, you could just put in a citation at the end of it. This is from Section 2.1 of the City Council. That way, yes, you've incorporated that, but if the City Council rules change, then, of course, we're going to refer to that section of the City Council rules, whatever is the current...

Yeah.

I think it is helpful having one sort of, you know.

I would so appreciate that. Thank you.

New user's guide.

Yeah. Are there any other comments or questions from commissioners? All right. Any more items from staff or anticipated schedule Planning Commission activities?

Nothing on the docket currently, just by way of background. So, well, we do have code maintenance coming, so Jeremiah can talk about that. But also, you can expect to see a notice and solicitation published for the urban growth boundary amendment process that we've talked about. So that is expected to go out June 1st. That won't be coming for the Planning Commission, but we can keep the Commission updated on the process. So with that, I'm going to hand it to Jeremiah to talk about the... Do you want to do the annexation? Well, yeah, so while there's... This won't come to the Planning Commission either, but there were property owners in the sort of southwest quadrant of the city in the Riverfront District. Oh, and a couple of parcels are primarily in the floodplain and stream corridor area over there who have asked the city, well, they have applied now to have their property removed from the city limits. And the reason for that is serviceability. They would rather just build three units in the county. So that prompted a discussion where we went to council and sort of checked in with them to see, is this something that you're even willing to entertain? And sort of the feedback was, possibly. It would need to be, ultimately, I think we would want to see, you know, that property, if it were de-annexed, it would also make sense to have it removed from the urban growth boundary. So it wouldn't be counting toward our land supply in a way that it can't actually be used. And then there's Anyway, so that's what's coming before the city council. They've applied for that de-annexation, and that's pretty much it. Do you have anything to add on that?

De-annexation?

Okay. No. So with that, we do have code maintenance work coming up, and Jeremiah can talk about the schedule for that if you'd like.

Sure. So code maintenance, I believe the work discussion is scheduled for August at this point. And then to have a hearing, I believe, I want to say in October, and have it adopted by city council by the end of the year. And in effect, I should say, in fact, by the end of the year. So... be looking for that. It probably he'll saw a bunch of the housing bills tonight. There's some other code maintenance items that will come up. We'll be looking for your input on so And so we'll be seeing that soon. One other thing I wanted to mention, since it's kind of been in the news here or there, the Hive Project on North College Street, we approved their land use this week. And so that stands for Housing Innovation Village Experience, I think, where they're using alternative construction methods to try and speed up the construction. housing production out there as part of a cottage cluster. So I think that's all I have.

Thank you very much, Steph. Are there any items from any commissioners besides me? Okay. I put a piece of paper in front of everybody. And I have talked to both staff members prior to getting here. And this is about our case that we had brought before us on book about the letter that was sent out that had a instead of being a plain white envelope, it has a 76 express. So when people got this notice in the mail, it came before the board that they didn't, they threw it away as junk mail. And I would like to put this on our agenda For a draft amendment to the Newburgh Municipal Code that requires mail notices from the city to be placed in plain envelopes, showing only the applicant's or sender's address on the front with no advertising, promotional copy, or other markings that could make the mail appear to be junk mail or business mail.

If I may, the notices that you're referring to were not mailed by the city. but they did contain notices that are part of the city's permit process. So I think our process puts that responsibility on the applicants to mail those notices. I think what you're asking for is some uniformity on what those envelopes look like that they mail.

Yes. How do the other commissioners feel about that?

Yeah, it makes sense to me. I wouldn't.

Yeah. You know, city letterhead, like you got there.

I'm supportive of it, Commissioner Rickert.

Hi, Randy. Hi, Randy. Make a motion to add to our.

We need to make a motion.

I don't think you said I didn't need to make one.

Yeah, I think we've had this discussion and we've been tracking it. And I think it's part of the code maintenance updates is something that staff is aware of. And we would like to come up with a good solution to that. Right.

So I think if they're working on it, we can let them keep working on it.

Yes, please keep working on it. And the other issue I've also brought in front of them was data centers here are really becoming a problem nationwide. And there was a project in Michigan that the local... local township planning commission and board unanimously rejected the rezoning request, citing conflicts with agriculture zoning and township master plan. And two days later, they were sued. and quickly, facing the cost of litigation, settled very quickly, allowing for the construction to proceed under a court agreement with no new rezoning vote or public hearing. And we do have codes under the industrial for IT services, but I would like to see us adopt a new chapter of the Newburgh Municipal Code titled Data Center Facilities, enforcing some of the issues with the Oregon's system gives cities and counties stronger tools than Michigan's township model, but developers can still exploit loopholes if local codes aren't explicit, such as codifying infrastructure definitions, defined data center as an industrial use requiring a discretionary view, and I think you had a wonderful insight anybody that withdraws a huge amount of water to not actually put it under IT only, to put it under any entity that would excessively draw water or any of these, any of the things that they would want to do to build an IT center. How does the

I'm in favor of some sort of restriction like what you're talking about, because I tend to agree with that. I have to be very careful how we write it, though, like you're saying, because they're going to get creative because we're talking billions. However, I don't know that Newberg's really in a lot of danger for this, specifically. It seems like they're mostly focusing right now. I just saw a Twitter post, so take that for what it's worth, about data centers... Going up like Weeds and Aloha and Beaverton and that sort of place. So I think if it's taking up there, then why would they also do it here? Because data centers have a regional impact, not a local impact.

Well, this is an issue that has come before me in a number of other meetings with groups throughout the area that they are very concerned about some data centers getting here. Even small ones can consume a million gallons a day.

I'm in favor of looking for loopholes to potentially close on that, but we don't need to go crazy either, I don't think. I know.

If the concern is water consumption, we could make an update directly related to water consumption and tiers of that when it comes to industrial infrastructure.

I think it's more damage that they do than just water consumption. That's one of the main ones, but... We just sit down and look at all the various potential loopholes before we decide on water alone. Because there's lots of ways, like you were saying, that you can do end arounds around various things, including that. So if you just have one thing with water, then that's probably not enough.

And there's also issues with water impact, energy impact, cooling technology, cumulative regional analysis, community benefit arrangement. And this can be a minimum of community benefits, such as local hiring targets, workforce training, property tax commitments, public infrastructure contributions, water and energy offsets. In some of these areas, the citizens are actually paying for 100% of their infrastructure. And so I'd like to see us get some really good things on the books to benefit this area just in case. And case in point, if like they were doing one in Hillsboro or at the edge of the county and it overlapped on a lot that ran into Yamhill County, then we would have to deal with it. In that situation, and there are a lot of properties on that ridge that straddle both. As just a concern.

That does remind me of one more thing to ask of staff, because you don't have enough.

What was that? Was that a motion, or was that a discussion and some brainstorming? We will take your direction if there is direction.

How about some direction towards staff about looking for some potential restrictions that could be used to protect the community from the rapacious nature of these sorts of things? So yeah, there needs to be some data centers, but the way that they're going about it is very negative to the various communities they're putting them into. As you say, there's uh uh power draw and water draw and with nothing or just turn for for the surrounding community other than you know essentially what amounts to subsidization which is you know so you're getting hit you're getting hit when they hit when they build it hit hit with this stuff that they're costing and then hit again with with you know them being there and not even providing any jobs other than the construction of the initial facility so

I do have a motion. But I rather you guys... I would hope that, yes, we could collaborate and work together and see before we made anything in stone.

So, yeah. As you say, there's lots of things to do, but add that to maybe your list for the For the next little while, as I was saying, I don't see anything coming along in the next, say, six months, eight months, ten months, whatever. But after that, you know, I mean, we may benefit to have all that stuff in place before we get under the gun.

So we would, you know, the way that this would be prioritized and put into the queue is that it would be added to the long-range planning work program and As we work through the list, we would study that. We would come to the planning commission with a work session. I mean, no one is asking to build one here. And the last time we met with PGE, we said, we might be able to provide five megawatts of power to a large industrial user. And you know, that would be with some additional facilities going in. So I don't think we're a high-risk community, but I think it's good for us, as you're suggesting, to understand it and be prepared.

That would be my suggestion. It's just as you say.

Yeah, some of the cities are even including decommissioning. What happens if something happens to the building? Who's responsible for decommissioning it then? Yeah, there are great many avenues that need to be explored. Please. Thank you. We hear you.

Thanks. Yeah, so last year we had the update or conversation about different sidewalk options for development. I haven't heard anything yet on that. Does staff have any update on that? the direction from that council meeting to look into additional sidewalk options and variance?

Yeah, thank you, Commissioner. I think that discussion was helpful, was valuable, as it's informed, I think, the design approach on River Street, particularly. So they are looking at alternative sections in that project in particular. There hasn't been any direction or any movement from council on... developing policy or revisiting our current standards. So if that were something that commission wanted to take up again, I think because it has been before the city council, we would want to check in with them as well and see if they want us to be working on that. Do you have any comments for the council?

Oh, I would say, I mean, I think it's worth examining. Maybe I walked away with a different understanding from that conversation. I thought that we'd come to the conclusion that we should work with the people you guys were working with to develop additional uh, sidewalk options for us, you know, for the council and the commission to examine and approve. Uh, so I thought it was still more underway than it sounds like it is. Um, and so I guess I would go to the other commissioners here to say, is that something we're interested in, in pursuing or asking, uh, we're not really pursuing it, but asking the, uh, uh, our staff to pursue and creating more options than, because currently there are no options for any curb-tight sidewalks, that all sidewalks need to have some sort of buffer between it and the street. So.

Commissioner, sidewalk maintenance program. No, it's also been on my mind.

I can give you the official process answer to that, and that is that the process that would that we would use typically to update the city street sections, which is what we're talking about. And to come up with alternatives for street trees in particular would be when the transportation system plan is reviewed and updated. And that's on our list of projects. We're applying for a grant again this year to do that work. So that would be one pathway. I think the other approach would be more ad hoc and trying to you know, do something on a one-off basis. But I think the River Street project is going to be exploring some alternative sections for at least for a collector street that might be useful.

And I know, Fay, you mentioned that we do have a funding program with the city for sidewalks?

For property owners? Actually, we, in the past, we've used to have a grant that they could, property owners could go and help get funded for sidewalk replacement. Unfortunately, we have not had that for the past couple of years. We did also have a program where we would Could do the sidewalk replacement for the city would do it with our concrete crew at a less expensive cost than if they were to get a contractor, but they are so behind right now. Our concrete crew is that they're unable to provide that service at this time until everything gets caught up with a replacement of all the ADA ramps and everything. So that's still. out there, but it's just not in play right now because of the fact that it's they just don't have the capacity to do any of those type of projects.

So this is an issue for me as a homeowner. If the city engineer sent me a letter within 90 days, I have to have a sidewalk up in front of my house. And if I don't get it paid for, my house could be attached or any house can be attached with liens. And that is my understanding of that code. So I would love to see an amendment to the new municipal code establishing a sidewalk maintenance and funding program.

Well, that would be a budgetary decision, so I don't think it requires a code amendment to do that, but I think the feedback would be to the City Council that you, I don't know if this is the Commission speaking, but any individual who wanted assistance through a program such as the one that Faye was describing, you'd be making a budget request, and we're halfway into the two-year budget right now, so it wouldn't typically be added to the budget, you know, now it would be in the next cycle.

If those grant programs are no longer available, is it possible to, like the Oh, Oregon city. They have a funding, a literal matrix for funding, uh, for sidewalks, for, uh, property owners, businesses, things like that. Um, is there any possible way we can look into funding programs like that? Um, similar to the city, Oregon cities.

I mean, again, that's an ask to the city council and the budget process. And I know in this community, there's not a lot of resources for grant programs. So we're not standing up any grant programs that I'm aware of, but it's not my call.

But that would be the pathway first to go to city council and the budget process. Yeah, correct. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Any other comments, questions from commissioners? The Newberg Planning Commission meeting on May 14th, 2026 is now adjourned.