Seated, But Not Sitting Out: The subdudes go low key and lowercase

Deschutes County Commissioners recently voted not to approve the City of Bend's request to form an urban renewal district to fund development at the Bend Airport. The primary reason was that it would rob other governmental agencies, like the sheriff's department and 911, of much needed revenues.
Unlike the county's considered approach, the present City Council of the City of Bend is now promoting Urban Renewal Districts (URD's) with abandon. They ignore the problems created by URD's. The major problems with URD's are threefold. First, they are authorized to borrow large sums of money, without a vote of the people. Second, they divert taxes from other governmental taxing authorities to be spent solely on city URD projects. And third, if the new taxes in the URD are insufficient to repay the loans, they must then be repaid from the city general fund (property tax) revenues.
The City Council in August 2005 formed the Juniper Ridge URD to include the 500 acres of Juniper Ridge that was in the city and zoned for industrial uses. It also included a second area, of 200 acres west of Highway 97, and not connected to Juniper Ridge. That area includes Lowes, the Wall Mart site and neighboring properties. These were included solely to increase the tax base for the district, as they clearly have no connection to Juniper Ridge and obviously no need for assistance.