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Date ArticleType
1/17/2024 Member News

HBA Opposes King City and North Plains Ballot Measures


There are two misguided ballot initiatives coming to two small cities in our region, both of which could set a hazardous precedent for the homebuilding industry. Two ballot measure will be coming to voters in February and May of 2024. While different legal positions, there are striking similarities in each that may make it more difficult for our members’ ability to acquire the land needed to provide adequate housing for our communities.

King City Council Recall—the first challenge coming to voters this year is just a few weeks away in King City, where a small group of disgruntled citizens have gathered enough signatures to recall six out of seven City Councilors, including their pro-housing Mayor Jaimie Fender. The election will be held on February 13th, 2024. HBA is opposed to this radical recall, and we urge you to support the campaign to defeat it.

The issue stems from the 2018 decision by council (and approved by Metro) to expand their Urban Growth Boundary by 500 acres to build roughly 3,000 needed, new homes for existing and future residents. Rather than working collaboratively with council to concept a workable vision for growth, a few property owners are instead attempting to torpedo the years of thoughtful work carried by council and citizens to address the city and region’s housing affordability crisis, with the ultimate goal of reversing the established UGB growth decision.

We urge our members and voters in King City to VOTE NO to this radical recall. For more information, please visit RejectTheRecall.com.

North Plains UGB Referendum—Similar to the King City recall, a few wealthy landowners have gathered enough signatures to put a recent City Council decision to expand its Urban Growth Boundary up for a vote in the May Primary election. While council’s unanimous UGB growth decision in the summer of 2023 is largely dedicated to employment lands, this would have the potential to generate roughly 1,000 new homes in North Plains.

As with King City, this referendum has the potential to halt nearly a decade of thoughtful and citizen-led planning for growth. What’s perhaps more concerning is the precedent that this challenge could have for future expansion decisions—even as voter-approved annexations were outlawed in 2016 by the state legislature. We believe that this new tactic, being propped up by a combination of farmers, environmentalists and anti-growth NIMBYs has the potential to spread to other cities in Oregon and extend beyond cities’ UGB decision-making authority.