Someone in Bend must be reading this blog, or at least thinking along the same lines. In 2017, after the Wine Country fires had burned homes in Santa Rose, the Antiplanner noted that the problem was the homes were too dense and needed a buffer of low-density homes around them. I made the same point after the Camp Fire burned homes in Paradise.
Now Deschutes County is zoning a buffer between Bend and the national forest for low-density housing. The zone calls for one home every 2.5 acres, which is probably not dense enough — one home every acre would be sufficient and would make it more likely that homeowners would treat their entire properties to minimize fire risk.
The land that Deschutes County is zoning as a fire buffer is outside of Bend’s urban-growth boundary. Under Oregon land-use planning rules, lands outside of but adjacent to the boundary may be zoned “rural residential” with 5- to 10-acre minimum lot sizes. It is likely that the county is going for 2.5-acre lot sizes because it fears it couldn’t get away with one-acre lot sizes. Continue reading
