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While city, state and regional government officials last week rejoiced that federal authorities OK’d acquisition of right-of-way for the Columbia River Crossing project, oral arguments over another aspect of the CRC were presented at the Oregon Supreme Court.

The court is expected to decide in the coming months whether Metro inappropriately used a fast-track land-use process to gain approval for the approximately $4 billion rail, road and bridge project. The appeal came from environmental and neighborhood groups that claim Metro is attempting to limit public input. The court’s decision could significantly affect both the length of the land-use process and public support for the project.

The Land Use Final Order process was enacted in legislation in 1997 as a way to consolidate land-use hearings for a north-south light-rail extension planned between Clackamas Town Center and Vancouver, Wash.

鈥淭he idea was that these light-rail projects pass through a number of jurisdictions,鈥� Metro senior attorney Dick Benner said.

The Oregon Department of Transportation and transit agency TriMet going through an application process for a zoning change, comprehensive map amendments and so on in multiple jurisdictions 鈥渨ould be a nightmare, and would take a long, long time,鈥� Benner said.

The LUFO process thus allows the state Land Conservation and Development Commission to create a smaller set of approval criteria that applies to all project parts. Each municipality is required to approve the project, and can apply only limited conditions for approval.

Metro is using the LUFO process for the CRC on the basis that the project will, among other things, extend the light-rail line to Vancouver. The language instituting the process allows light rail and 鈥渁ny highway improvements to be included in the project鈥� to go through land-use review only at Metro, and not at every local level.

Opponents say that the CRC is much bigger than only a light-rail project with highway improvements.

鈥淭his is essentially a highway expansion; less than 20 percent (of the CRC project) is light rail,鈥� said Steven Cole, a board member of the Northeast Coalition of Neighborhoods.

Cole contended that the fast-track process was therefore inappropriate.

鈥淢etro used this process to limit public input,鈥� he said. 鈥淲e don’t think it’s appropriate with the scope of this project.鈥�

Oregon Supreme Court justices last week questioned an attorney for the Northeast Coalition of Neighborhoods and the Coalition for a Livable Future about why he believed the 鈥渉ighway improvements鈥� mentioned in the LUFO legislation should be narrowly defined to not include much of the CRC.

Justices also asked Metro and TriMet attorney Mark Greenfield why he thought the opposite was true; and where the boundaries are for highway improvements that could and could not be included in the LUFO.

Benner said that one option for Metro and TriMet, depending on the Supreme Court’s decision, would be to split the project between 鈥渉ighway improvements鈥� that fit under the LUFO and those that don’t. The latter would need to be handled separately, he said.

鈥淚f the court agreed with petitioners that the highway improvements that are included in the project have to be related more closely than they are, they would send it back to us,鈥� Benner said. 鈥淭riMet would have to go through each of the improvements, see if they are 鈥榬elated,’ and if not, we’d have to take them out.鈥�

If the Supreme Court were to side with the petitioners, Benner said the project could face a much slower approval process.

鈥淚t would be a lot more time, and opponents of the project would have a lot more opportunities to appeal those decisions to (the Land Use Board of Appeals),鈥� Benner said. 鈥淚t could tie it up for quite a while.鈥�

The entire LUFO process is on a fast track, so appeals, for example, went straight to the Supreme Court. It has no deadline to issue its decision; however, Benner said that there is a precedent to believe the decision will happen within about two months.

If the court were to side with Metro, however, Cole said that the Northeast Coalition of Neighborhoods may pursue other avenues to challenge the project. The group is weighing whether to challenge federal approval of the project’s environmental impact statement.

Regardless of what the Oregon Supreme Court decides, Metro will have one key issue to address: Only parts of the project within Portland’s urban growth boundary fall under the LUFO’s purview, which includes all of the CRC project aspects in Oregon, but not a small section between the north tip of Hayden Island and the state border in the middle of the Columbia River.

The Land Use Board of Appeals informed Metro that this must be addressed, because the project’s current LUFO includes this area outside Portland’s UGB. Benner said Metro will either expand the UGB or use a separate land-use process for that portion of the project.