A barn on property in the Woodland Bottoms.
Woodland Community Development is set to provide a recommendation on possible growth planning changes on Thursday following weeks of public input.
The Woodland Planning Commission will have a hearing on changes to the city’s comprehensive growth management plan in order to come up with their own recommendation to send to the city council. On the table are map changes to the city’s urban growth area, land outside of city limits that will be the focus of development as the city grows.
The community development department hosted five open houses in November and December in order to hear input from residents on potential changes. Community Development Director Travis Goddard estimated about 100 people in total attended the events.
Though opinions varied, he said individuals tended to fall into two groups: one being that the city shouldn’t be growing and the other in favor of growth. In both cases the groups were in favor of planning, however. Goddard elaborated that those in opposition to growth were more concerned about fixing issues within the city first before looking at any expansion.
The issue there would be that the city has limited resources as it stands.
“It’s kind of the cruel mathematics of taxes and growth,” Goddard said, asking the question of how to fix problems without growing the local economy. “If we had the money to fix the problems, we wouldn’t have the problems we currently have.”
The potential changes have been framed in six scenarios that range from no expansion of the urban growth boundary to including the whole of the Woodland Bottoms to the southwest and west of city limits.
Understandably, the scenario without any map changes was a favorite of those opposing growth. Goddard said an alternative scenario — including places with development applications and adjacent properties to fill in holes — also received support as “a good way to plan for the future.”
There were others who preferred including already-applied development areas, adjacent properties and the Woodland Bottoms, referred as Scenario 6 in staff documents.
Though at the planning commission hearing Goddard will be providing analysis of all six scenarios, his recommendation to them will be for Scenario 6 as he considers it the best one for long-range planning. He explained that having the area included made sense given how interdependent the city and the Bottoms were.
“What happens in the Woodland Bottoms directly affects the city of Woodland,” Goddard said. “If we are not planning for those impacts, whether it occurs in the city or the county, then we are not doing a good job planning at all.”
“I think it was pretty consistent that the city needed to do a better job planning going forward,” Goddard, who started as community development director in January, said, referencing comments from the open houses.
The planning commission will make their own recommendation following the public hearing. Their recommendation will then head to the city council who will look at staff and the commission recommendations along with public input for the final decision.
Following the work on the comprehensive plan Goddard said looking at the city’s six-year work plans would be a next step, explaining that a focus on proactive measures would prevent the city from having some of the issues within city limits it currently faces. He gave an example of utility systems planning as being a point needing improvement.
“Our current improvement plans are mostly to fix our existing problems, which means that new problems coming towards us, we’re not preparing for those,” Goddard explained. He said part of the issue related to the city’s decision not to update its urban growth area map during its 2016 comp plan update, adding that predictions on growth out to 2036 were relying on a 2005 map.
If included in the growth boundary, properties wouldn’t be forced into any particular kind of development different from what they currently have and operate under, Goddard said.
“The fact that there might be farmers in the growth boundary who are not interested in development … inclusion in the growth area would really have no effect on their continuing agricultural operations,” Goddard said.
