House Bill 3540B, the Measure 37 fix that passed the Oregon House several weeks ago, has been a lot like Oceanic Airlines Flight 815: Lost.
Thanks to the NW Republican blog, a likely reason why has been YouTube'd up. In a speech on the House floor, Rep. Bill Garrard decries backroom deal making that has been going on between the Governor, Democratic legislative leaders, and so-called special interest groups.
Garrard, a Republican member of the Joint Land Use Fairness Committee that came up with the Measure 37 fix, opines that the closed door negotiations over amendments to HB 3540B are aimed at getting "special interest groups to keep their mouths shut" when a ballot referral is sent to the voters.
I don't know what he means by that. The Oregon Farm Bureau supports the bill. So does 1000 Friends of Oregon. Maybe some sweeteners are being put on the table to please large timber companies with Measure 37 claims, but I doubt it.
What I hope is happening is an effort to squeeze out a few more House member votes so a ballot referral isn't necessary. It'd be much better to pass a Measure 37 fix directly, rather than asking voters to approve a complex bill that will be reduced to a simplistic sound bite by lie-loving Oregonians in Action.
At any rate, it's comical to hear a leading House Republican decry backroom deals after so many years of Queen Karen Minnis sitting on her Speaker of the House throne and issuing edicts from on high. Give me a break, Rep. Garrard.
A commenter on NW Republican put it concisely and neatly:
Politicians making deals! I am shocked -- SHOCKED, I tell you!
I left my own comment:
Polls show that two-thirds of voters want Measure 37 repealed or fixed. So how is fixing it a concession to special interests?
Actually, it's a concession to the public interest.
The main special interests here are the big timber companies and other large corporations who bank-rolled Measure 37 and are now cashing in by filing claims to put subdivisions on farm and forest land.
Get out in the real world. Come out to my neighborhood and talk to people who voted for Measure 37 and are now dead set against it, now that they are facing a 43-home (and well) claim in a groundwater limited area that's also farmland.
Those who already live here have rights too. Measure 37 ignored us. HB 3540 helps restore our rights. It's a decent bill but needs to be made even stronger. Kudos to the governor and legislative leaders for trying to do that.
I assumed that is what they're trying to do. If not, anti-kudos to them.
If you carefully read HB 3540 (as opposed to the Republican members of the Legislature) and if you compare what the Bill provides with what proponents argued when Measure 37 was on the ballot, you cannot help but note how generous the provisions are.
Now if you cannot find the generosity that is in the Bill, that may be because you are more interested in the stealth provisions hidden behind, and through omission, in Measure 37. There are two such key stealth provisions, which are corollaries of the truly devious intent of the Measure.
The first stealth provision is the Measure’s failure to provide for a means of assessing lost value. The way the Measure is written, any loss of value (for which the Measure provides no help in determining) entitles the owner to make a claim.
The second stealth provision allows the property owner seek any form of development that was permitted when the property was purchased. When you read all of the arguments proposed in favor of the Measure, they talk about how government refused to allow replacement of dwellings or for the ability to build one or maybe two new homes. Try to find anywhere in the arguments references to malls, shopping centers, resorts, subdivisions, or gravel pits, just to mention some of the goals to be found in claims filed just in Marion County. You will find those arguments, but you have to go the the arguments in opposition.
These provisions are corollaries of what the Measure really does. It undermines the principles of zoning by taking away the framework that comprehensive plans provide. It does this because the intent of the real proponents is to institute a materialistic attitude toward land that even a Karl Marx would find repulsive. Land is chattel; land is like your shoes – care for them or abuse them, it should be of no concern to anyone but yourself. A critical provision of their philosophy is that communities do not exist, only individuals. If there are only individuals, you have no need for zoning, or very little. The market will bear is what ought to be.
When you look at this debate through this lens, you can then understand why Boquist, George, Winters, and Thatcher (just to name local politicians – oh, and we do need to include Patty Milne, Marion County Commissioner and who knows how many of her counterparts in other parts of the state) argue, mislead, and otherwise treat their non-libertarian (possibly we should call them non-anarchist) constituents with such contempt.
When you argue the concept implicit in 37, you will get no more coherent answer than that provided by Gerard, and written in the SJ by Kim Thatcher
Posted by: Richard | May 27, 2007 at 08:56 AM