Super Lawyers 2017

August 4, 2017

We are pleased to announce that Valerie Athena Tomasi, was nominated by her peers to the Oregon Super Lawyers list in 2017 for Banking Law, maintaining a 7 year track record on the list. In addition, Jennifer Bragar received the Rising Star designation for land use and has received the designation since 2012. Elizabeth Biermann received the Rising Star designation…

Tillamook County’s 2017 Housing Plan

April 21, 2017

In March 2017, Tillamook County issued its new housing needs analysis, “Creating a Healthy Housing Market for Tillamook County.” The County recognized the necessity to take a new approach to the analysis of housing in light of its changed economy. The study utilizes graphic representations and analysis of the coastal and interior markets to focus on the need for regional solutions. Coastal…

Analysis of Zoning Barriers that Limit the Construction of Manufactured Housing

April 7, 2017

In the Portland metropolitan region, we often think of affordable housing in urban terms – increased density, homelessness, and accessory dwelling units, but considering the issue in rural areas requires a different lens on how to build low cost housing. This post reviews zoning barriers that limit the construction of manufactured housing that were identified by renowned land use law…

Oregon’s Land Use and Conservation Development Commission Issues Final Enforcement Order Against the City of Corvallis

March 24, 2017

The tension around whether clear and objective standards must apply to a proposed residential development gripped the City of Corvallis and one developer in a multi-year legal battle at the Oregon Land Use Board of Appeals (“LUBA”) that left the developer in a cycle of remands about how the city would apply its standards. Fed up with the cycle, the…

Big Win for the Confederated Tribes: Oil Trains in Oregon Face New Hurdle

March 11, 2017

The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, Warm Springs Reservation of Oregon, and Bands of the Yakima Nation (collectively the “Treaty Tribes”) have been opposed to an Union Pacific oil-by-rail project that called for trains from oil-producing regions to deliver the crude to ports where ships could move it to refineries along the West Coast. Notwithstanding the oil train derailment in…

Recent Developments in Comprehensive Planning Law

February 22, 2017

Ed Sullivan and Jennifer Bragar co-authored the annual comprehensive plan update for the American Bar Association’s State and Local Government Law Section. The most recent update was just published by the Urban Lawyer and you can read about it here. The article undertakes an annual survey of state and federal cases dealing with the role of the comprehensive plan (sometimes called the “General” or…