Mt. Hood Meadows Ski Resort’s revised plan for a park and ride includes the reduction of parking spaces from 249 to 179. Originally, the resort also planned to remove most of the 37 trees on the property to make way for the spaces, but has since reduced that number to 10 trees.
Mt. Hood Meadows Ski Resort’s revised plan for a park and ride includes the reduction of parking spaces from 249 to 179. Originally, the resort also planned to remove most of the 37 trees on the property to make way for the spaces, but has since reduced that number to 10 trees.
An appeal filed against Hood River County’s decision to approve the initial concept of a park and ride planned for use by Mt. Hood Meadows Ski Resort has been rejected by the Oregon Land Use Board of Appeals (LUBA).
In what was arguably one of the briefest briefs regarding a land use decision affecting Hood River County, LUBA issued a two-page final order on Oct. 15 that dismissed an appeal from Libby Rossknecht on the grounds that the county had already rescinded its first decision on the park and ride, making the issue moot.
Hood River County Planning Department approved Meadows’ original plan for a 249-space park and ride lot to be located near the corner of Highway 35 and Cooper Spur Road back in June. Meadows said it planned to use the area to bus guests and employees, particularly on peak snow days, to the resort located 21 miles to the south.
Due to what was described as a “discrepancy” in its own zoning ordinance, the county subsequently rescinded its own decision, which was made by way of a ministerial action that does not require the notification of neighboring property owners. Meadows then submitted a revised park and ride proposal that called for 179 spaces and for the application to be processed by way of an administrative action, which requires the county to notify neighboring property owners of the project. The county approved that plan in late September.
Rossknecht filed an appeal with LUBA arguing that the county erred when issuing its original decision by way of a ministerial action and not providing proper public notice. The county then filed a motion to dismiss the appeal in late August on the grounds that they had already rescinded the decision.
In early September, Rossknecht filed a request to deny the county’s motion to dismiss. Though the county had already rescinded its own decision by the time Rossknecht filed her appeal, she stated in an earlier interview with the News that the county needed to file a “formal withdrawal of their decision to LUBA.”
However, LUBA stated in its Oct. 15 decision that it disagreed with Rossknecht, noting that “one option available to a local government that no longer wishes to defend a decision on appeal, based on an applicant’s withdrawal of the application, and wishes to terminate an appeal as expeditiously as possible, is to adopt a new decision that revokes or rescinds the challenged decision.”
Rossknecht said she was disappointed in the ruling, but only slightly.
“It is disappointing only in that it means that if/when this comes back around to LUBA, the county’s original error of not providing proper noticing will not be included in the hearing, which would have allowed me to get some costs back,” she explained in an email. “Other than that, we have accomplished what would have happened in a LUBA hearing anyway — they would have remanded this back to the county to follow the correct noticing procedure and take care of other deficiencies.”
Moreover, Rossknecht now has an appeal at the county level challenging the planning department’s decision to approve the 179-space version of the park and ride late last month. In her appeal, Rossknecht stated the county’s decision is “not consistent with the provisions of the Mt. Hood Community Plan,” and violates county zoning ordinances. She added that the county’s record of the decision does not contain any “findings” as required by statute, and contains “other deficiencies.”
The appeal will be heard by the Hood River County Planning Commission at a public hearing to be held Wednesday, Nov. 12 at 7 p.m.
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