March 9, 2007

Measure 37: A costly process for Wasco Co.

By ED COX
of The Dalles Chronicle

     Only this reporter was in the audience for Wednesday’s first-ever denial of a Measure 37 claim by the Wasco County Court.
     The unwillingness of the absent claimants to withdraw what they were informed was a clearly invalid claim had county planning staff complaining about costs of the process to the county.
     “We just blew a thousand dollars,” associate planner Dawn Baird told commissioners after they announced their verdict to an otherwise empty courtroom. “We don’t have a thousand dollars to just blow.”
     That’s the planning department’s “ballpark” estimate of the costs to the county — in combined staff time, legal notices, postage and paper — of processing a Measure 37 claim. Meanwhile, the county charges no fee to claimants for the service.
     Baird said “at least half” of those costs could have been avoided in this case if Wednesday’s claimants, Donald Clauson and Connie Moe, had taken her suggestion to withdraw the claim when it became clear she was recommending denial to the court.
     Not only did they not withdraw, she said, but they waited — despite plenty of notice — until after the hearing was scheduled to inform her that they could not make that time and date.
     While she stressed that it was “absolutely” the right of claimants to have their case heard, even if it is likely to be denied, she said she would have preferred they not force the county to absorb those costs.
     “If they were paying for it, they would have withdrawn it,” she said.
The claim was for $160,000 in compensation for value allegedly lost due to changes in land use regulations that restricted uses on property acquired by Connie Moe on Feb. 26, 1996.
     However, Baird explained to the court, on Oct. 1, 2004, Moe transferred ownership to Clauson, her cousin, who on the same day made a transfer back into Moe’s and his name.
     Such same-day transfers constitute a break in ownership, Baird explained, which in this case invalidated the claim, since claims must be based on an uninterrupted string of ownership within an immediate family or a direct family line.
     “Cousins don’t count,” she said, adding that that degree of relationship is not listed in a state definition of “family” that is specific to Measure 37.
     According to county planning director Todd Cornett, if Clauson and Moe had been siblings, the claim would have been valid, and the court would have waived current rules — but only back to Oct. 1, 2004, as the current date of acquisition.
However, that would have been no use to the claimants, he said, because 2004 rules are essentially the same as current rules, meaning the “new” restrictions on the use would still stand.
     “They essentially wouldn’t get anything,” he said. Meanwhile, he said the county absorbs the costs.
     “Not that it’s a good thing or a bad thing, but it’s an unfunded thing,” said Cornett.
     Baird expressed hope that in the future people would withdraw claims that were clearly invalid or “futile” and “save us some money.”
     That would be particularly helpful this year, considering that the court is slated to hear 30 separate claims in the month of May alone — representing an estimated cost to the county of $30,000 to 40,000, according to Baird.
     Of those 30 claims, Cornett estimated that perhaps six would likely be denied or else result in waivers that would have no impact on permitted uses.
     The May “rush” results from a flurry of filings in the weeks before the Dec. 4, 2006, deadline for making a claim directly. Now that that date has passed, property owners must first have a land use application denied before they are allowed to make a Measure 37 claim.
     All costs of processing that type of application are billed to the applicant, meaning that, in Baird’s words, people have to be “pretty serious” to pursue a claim from here on out.
     “If we survive May, we won’t have to worry about it anymore,” she said, noting that no new claims have been filed since Dec. 4.
     Wasco County Judge Dan Ericksen said he still considers the decision not to charge a fee for Measure 37 claims the correct one, despite the burden it places on the county and, therefore, taxpayers.
     “It costs the public, but that’s what the public voted for,” he said.
     He noted that Clackamas County has run into problems with the being unable to enforce fees and may face having to rebate those fees to claimants who did pay them.