A very contentious issue in Tangent is growth. At a recent Planning Commission Meeting, the Commissioners voted unanimously to recommend to the City Council a growth projection of 1501 by the year 2026 and recommended that it be placed on the November 2006 ballot. This number came from one of the tables (Table A) listed in a document prepared by the City Planner titled "City of Tangent Buildable Lands & The Urban Growth Boundary"
From the Planning Commission Minutes of 4-27-06, the following arguments in favor and opposed are given below:
Arguments in favor of the decision were as follows:
1. High probability voters would support it.
2. Need a better drainage plan to take care of existing problems before any new development.
3. Concern that water supply and quality could become a problem that needs investigating. We don’t want to have to hook up to Albany.
4. Street maintenance of existing roads will become an increasing cost and time consuming problem with increased traffic in new developments.
5. Enforcement of City Development Codes will increase at a time when we are already experiencing this problem.
6. Problems with existing development are taxing the energy and resources of the City.
7. Drainage is a system problem and we need to do system wide planning to solve current problems. Development causes more drainage problems because it doesn’t slowly penetrate the soil where there are roofs, driveways, and streets. It was also pointed out that water from those surfaces is polluted.
8. Planning is needed for where it is most appropriate for growth to occur while minimizing the impact on agricultural resource lands.
9. Growth can be better managed if it is slow and problems are small enough to be appropriately dealt with.
10. To the concern that larger parcels in the City would “never be developed in the next few years” it was pointed out how much current infilling has been occurring.
11. Systems Development Charges don’t cover all the costs for new development. Tangent needs to work with other communities so we can collect Systems Development charges for schools and fire departments. It was pointed out how he (Councilman Smith) had gotten them significantly raised and there were several comments that they probably are still not high enough.
Arguments opposed to the decision:
1. Development is the driver of City improvements. Lakecreek was improved because of the development of Loan Oaks, Lakecreek Ranch, and Ashwood.
2. A population of 1581 is coordinated with Linn County.
3. The Brush application uses the Transportation System Plan planning population.
4. To plan for more growth so we are ready for growth is better planning.
5. We have already been using 1600 rounded up from 1581.
6. There is a difference between planning and prevention.
Please give us your thoughts.
