of the cemetery, the applicant cannot provide evidence of the commitment required by EC <br />9.724(2)(a)(2) to provide needed services and facilities. <br />The Hearings Official acknowledged that "the opponents are correct that the proposed CIR <br />housing would run afoul of the 1995 CUP...". Decision of the Hearings Official, p. 11. <br />However, he held that "the application is specifically based on the premise (and a condition <br />of approval) that the applicant will also obtain a new CUP regarding the cemetery use that <br />allows Zone 6 to be removed from the cemetery CUP". Id. He concluded that "[a]ll of <br />opponents' arguments regarding the 1995 CUP...do not provide a basis to deny the <br />application". Id. <br />However, the commitment to provide private services and facilities is an approval criterion. <br />The Hearings Official needed to have a commitment from the applicant before he made his <br />decision and the applicant, given the restrictions in the 1995 CUP, simply could not make <br />such a commitment. The Hearings Official therefore erred in approving the application. <br />The Hearings Official also noted that "[n]ormally, the applicant would obtain the new CUP <br />for the cemetery that would remove Zone 6 before applying for the CIR housing, but <br />because the new statute [regarding the processing of remands] requires action on the <br />remanded CIR application within a certain time [180 days] the CIR CUP must proceed <br />before obtaining a new CUP for the cemetery". Decision of the Hearings Official, p.3. <br />The Hearings Official ignored the fact that the applicant has had 12 years since LUBA <br />denied modification of the 1995 CUP to file an application for a new CUP, but the applicant <br />failed to do so. But whatever the reason, the applicant does not presently have a CUP that <br />allows him to meet the approval criterion in EC 9.724(2)(a)(2) regarding a commitment and <br />the application must be denied. <br />In sum, evidence of a commitment under EC 9.724(2)(x)(2) is an approval criterion and is <br />necessary before the Hearings Official can make an affirmative finding. Since the 1995 CUP <br />precludes such a commitment, the Commission should reverse the Hearings Official's <br />decision. The Commission should hold that the Hearings Official erred in conditioning <br />approval on the applicant's obtaining a new CUP, and should hold that the applicant's <br />inability to make a commitment under EC 9.724(2)(a)(2) to provide private services requires <br />denial of the CIR-CUP application. <br />In addition, conditioning approval on a future CUP is not appropriate. It is purely <br />speculative at this point as to whether a future CUP, if any, will in fact excise the 15.8 acres <br />from the cemetery masterplan, whether it will impose conditions that might prevent or <br />adversely affect the development of services and facilities on the site, and whether it might <br />prevent or adversely affect uses on the site from accessing or sharing services and utilities on <br />other parts of the property. <br />It is instructive that the Hearings Official, in considering the applicability of the goal post <br />rule to standards that came into effect after the application was filed, noted that "[u]ntil any <br />future applications are submitted, any decision about what standards and criteria apply to <br />those applications would be pure speculation". Id. p.12. Similarly, until a future CUP <br />application to remove the 15.8 acres from the cemetery masterplan is submitted and decided, <br />7 <br />