Eugene Hearing Official <br />August 14, 2024 <br />Page 3 <br /> <br />1. The City may not apply any code provision that would negate or limit the applicant’s <br />Middle Housing rights, subject only to the exceptions listed in the Middle Housing Statute. <br />None of those exceptions applies to this site. The Middle Housing rights include the right to <br />a duplex, triplex or quadplex on this R-1 land. <br /> <br />Eugene has two state obligations to comply with the Middle Housing Statue. First, any plan or <br />code amendments it adopts to implement the program must comply with the statute, the rule and <br />applicable goals. The City has failed in its first two legislative efforts.1 Second, because the <br />statute always applies directly, any site-specific decision it makes must also comply with the <br />statute and its implementing rule. <br /> <br />There is one Middle Housing question in the decision you are about to make. That is: <br /> <br />May the City use standards in its overlay zones that stick to R-1 zoned property in <br />the South Hills to negate or limit Middle Housing rights created by the statute? <br />More specifically in this instance, may the City apply the standard in its /PD <br />overlay zone at EC 9.8325(8)(a) to negate Middle Housing rights on the 2+ acres <br />of this 15-acre site that are above the 901-foot elevation? <br /> <br />The standard in EC 9.8325(8)(a) is: <br /> <br />No development shall occur on land above an elevation of 901 feet except that <br />either middle housing or one single-unit dwelling may be built on any lot in <br />existence as of August 1, 2001. <br /> <br />The July 31 Staff Report (at Exhibit C Condition 24) requests enforcing this standard with the <br />following condition: <br /> <br />24. The final PUD plans shall be revised to remove any references to middle <br />housing lots to be created on land above 901-foot elevation. The final PUD plans <br />shall also include a note stating that: “No development of middle housing, single- <br />unit dwellings, or any other development, including but not limited to land <br />divisions, may occur on any land above 901-feet in elevation.” <br /> <br />This issue is not a surprise to the City. The same issue was put squarely to the City in a zone <br />verification application under EC 9.1080 more than 7 months ago. See the zone verification <br />application filed by the Western Oregon Builders Association on December 28, 2023, which was <br />submitted at the July 10 hearing with our hearing letter. That raised a series of questions <br /> <br />1 The city’s first effort was remanded for failure to adequately address Goal 11. Coopman v. City <br />of Eugene, __ Or LUBA __ (No. 2022-056, Jan. 27, 2023), rem’d, 327 Or App 6 (No. A180682, <br />July 12, 2023). Its second effort, which made new findings on Goal 11 was remanded because <br />those findings were not supported by the evidence. Conte v. City of Eugene, __ Or LUBA __ <br />(No. 2024-023, July 10, 2024). <br />