HB 2001 – Duplexes, Triplexes in Single Family Zones: This was House Speaker Tina Kotek’s priority housing bill. The bill requires cities over 10,000 population to allow duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes (quads), and cottage clusters (a group of tiny homes around the outer edge of a lot, with a central courtyard in the middle of the property) on all lots zoned for residential use in the city. The bill did not require property owners to convert, or prohibit them from constructing a single family dwelling. In fact, the bill gives property owners in single family zones more choices, with no mandates.
As you can expect, the bill was very controversial, particularly in urban areas. From OPOA’s perspective, however, allowing (but not requiring) property owners to convert their property to a different type of housing is fine. Our concern with HB 2001 is that Metro (the Portland area regional government) and the no-growth cities like Corvallis and Eugene will use this bill as a way of avoiding an expansion of their urban growth boundaries, meaning they won’t maintain a sufficient supply of land for housing. Metro/Cities will do that by counting lots containing single family dwellings as being capable of being used for multi-unit dwellings, regardless of whether the property will ever be redeveloped (which most of them won’t). Metro/Cities will then find that they have sufficient land to meet their housing needs for the next 20 years without a need to expand their urban growth boundary.
When cities grow and the elected officials in that city refuse to expand the urban growth boundary, it is inevitable that the cost of housing will rise. That is bad for everyone, especially our most vulnerable citizens. It also means that property owners who would otherwise have their land brought inside the urban growth boundary won’t get that opportunity.
Fortunately, OPOA was able to get amendments to the bill that made significant changes to the way Metro and the other large cities calculate both the amount of housing they can accommodate in the existing UGB (capacity) and the amount of housing they need over the next 20 years (need). The system is far from perfect, but it will be far more difficult for Metro and the no-growth cities to overcalculate their existing land supply as a way of avoiding an expansion of the urban growth boundary. With those amendments, OPOA supported the bill.