This is Floyd Wynne with THE VIEW FROM HERE 6/07/05

What is the Legislature doing about Measure 37?
Remember it was passed by a 61 percent approval by the people.
If certain restrictions have been placed on your property and they devalued that property, the government must either compensate you for the difference or waive the restrictions.
Let’s see now....the Legislature is going into its fifth month and they are still squabbling about what to do to further implement the measure.
Thus far the Oregonians in Action, who sponsored the Measure, and the Thousand Friends of Oregon who opposed the measure...have been trying to swing the legislation in their favor.
A Senate bill appears to be going no where. It would have been more liberal at permitting development on some farmlands, but there is little support for it.
Meantime, in the House, Klamath representative Bill Garrard is chairman of the Land Use Committee and has indicated that his committee will try to come forth with a suitable measure, although time is running out on committee actions.
Referring to the potential legislation, Garrard said: “This bill is nothing right here tonight. It’s simply a frame by which this committee hopes to build a better and improved measure. It is not our intent to change Measure 37 from what we believe it to be as far as the intent of the voting.”
We agree wholeheartedly with that view.
The so-called Thousand Friends of Oregon have tried to implement a three-tier program for farmland. As we understand it that would prevent any development on prime farmland, some actions on moderate farmland, whatever that is, permitting the owner to sell the devalued portion to a developer who could take that and build in an urban growth boundary. Just what they would do with poor farmland, I’m not certain.
Just who classifies the farmland is also another issue.
There also has been talk of putting together a state fund that could be used to compensate those land owners whose property has been devalued by the land use planning.
However, most of the Legislative Committees are scheduled to close up shop this week.
The question of the budget for the coming biennium appears to ber the sticking point.
My guess is that the issue will not be completed and the courts will be the decision makers in the future.
In the meantime....one wonders what the Legislature has accomplished all these months. Whatever happened to the plans to restore the school speed limits to common sense. Also...where is the budget in regards to school funding.
It seems to us that government doesn’t work wonders.....in some cases it doesn’t do much of anything until the very last minute.
Let’s hope the original intent of the sponsors of Measure 37 is not defeated at the Legislative or Court levels. It seems the peoples voices anymore count for very little in the courts of our land.

This is Floyd Wynne and that’s THE VIEW FROM HERE.