Kotek bill would allow Oregon cities another growth boundary expansion for housing

Gov. Tina Kotek is asking lawmakers to approve a bill that would allow cities to once again expand their urban growth boundaries so long as they use it to build senior housing or manufactured homes.

For the short session, House Bill 4082 develops on the theme of 2024 legislation that allows one-time urban growth boundary expansions. That legislation, Senate Bill 1537, was part of a package of bills meant to ease the way for new housing.

Under the new bill, depending on their size, cities could bring in either 50 or 100 acres, subject to some restrictions, into their growth boundaries for manufactured homes or dwellings for people aged 55 and older. The total cap for the Portland metropolitan area is 300 acres.

Many older Oregonians live on fixed incomes that don’t keep up with rising housing costs, Kotek told the House Committee on Housing and Homelessness earlier this week.

“Thousands of seniors are one emergency away from losing their homes,” the governor told fellow lawmakers. “Frankly, we just have to do better.”

The bill would also smooth the path for more manufactured housing production. The governor’s office, citing research from Harvard, said manufactured housing costs as little as 35% of the price of a stick-built home.

“Manufactured housing is one of the most affordable options available,” Kotek said.

Conservation groups including 1000 Friends of Oregon are currently neutral on the bill, which they say would effectively allow a second “short-cut” growth boundary expansion for cities that already qualified for one under 2024’s Senate Bill 1537.

Mary Kyle McCurdy, 1000 Friends’ associate director, acknowledged in written testimony that it’s difficult for manufactured and senior housing to compete against market-rate homes for land. Still, she wrote, 1000 Friends would like lawmakers to mandate denser senior housing than the bill currently contemplates.

“There is definitely a need for additional opportunities for manufactured home parks and for housing for seniors with moderate and low incomes,” McCurdy wrote.

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