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Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to clarify the status of Clackamas County‘s zoning amendment.

Village transitional housing developments like Kenton Women’s Village can face challenges due to zoning and land use restrictions.

When Clackamas County sought a site for a transitional housing project, officials chose a parcel on the far reaches of the Portland-metro area: on Southeast 115th Avenue, along a stretch of distribution warehouses for companies such as Fred Meyer, Bob’s Red Mill and Dave’s Killer Bread.

The property in an unincorporated area is owned by the county and zoned for industrial uses.

The site is far from ideal for transitional housing for a number of reasons. It’s remote from social services and employment centers, and poorly served by public transit.

Yet for local governments looking for somewhere to establish a site for homeless individuals, the options are few. In addition to frequent objections from neighbors, zoning and land use regulations are common obstacles.

Zoning schemes meant to separate industrial areas and residential neighborhoods, or apartments and single-family homes, make it difficult to find a home for the homeless.

鈥淭raditional zoning approaches aren’t always set up for dealing with houselessness, so sometimes it takes some creativity in developing new tools,鈥� said Andrew Yaden, a Clackamas County planner.

Clackamas County’s Board of Commissioners on June 27 approved moving forward with negotiations with Catholic Charities to operate a transitional housing facility.

Concurrently, the Planning Commission and Board of County Commissioners are considering a zoning ordinance amendment to allow for transitional housing.

鈥淭he county’s current land use regulations do not provide a clear pathway for organizations that would like to develop a transitional shelter community for houseless people,鈥� county staff members wrote in a memo to commissioners.

Clackamas County is looking to house veterans at the site. The facility will be equipped with a community kitchen, showers, restrooms, a community room and a work shed. Catholic Charities will operate the site. Officials with the nonprofit are looking into what issues the location could present.

鈥淲e’re looking into that right now to see what challenges that’s going to pose to us in terms of managing the community,鈥� spokesman Heli Del Moral said.

The county will bring plumbing and electricity to the 2-acre lot, clear blackberries and erect a new fence.

Yaden said the improvements are 鈥減retty minimal because the site is realistically ready to go.鈥� The changes also will give the county more flexibility if the site is ever sold.

鈥淭hese are improvements that will make the site more marketable in the future,鈥� Yaden said.

Fifteen sleeping pods will be ready to accommodate people by December. The remaining 15 pods will be built on-site by residents, who will gain basic carpentry skill, county spokesman Scott Anderson stated in a news release. The pods will be weather resistant and fully insulated and ventilated.

The sleeping-pod camp is just one response to homelessness, Yaden said. Clackamas County has formed a policy group of elected officials and department heads to examine other options.

鈥淲e’re trying to take a holistic approach, and this particular zoning amendment is hopefully just one of the tools we’ll be able to employ,鈥� Yaden said. 鈥淲e don’t think of this as the only site or only solution or only answer.鈥�

The sleeping-pod camp is a similar approach to an existing facility for homeless women in Portland’s Kenton neighborhood. That facility at 2221 N. Argyle St. is also managed by Catholic Charities. The parcel is zoned R1 for medium-density residential use.

Oregon City officials are also considering building a pod for the homeless in a church parking lot.

鈥淓veryone’s doing it a little bit differently, but this village approach is something that seems to be a common theme throughout the different projects that are finding success,鈥� Yaden said. 鈥淭here’s neat stuff going on up and down the West Coast.鈥�

New proposals often come into conflict with decades-old land-use regulations.

The broad outlines of Oregon’s land-use system date to 1973, when Senate Bill 100 was signed into law. That legislation was led by Sen. Hector McPherson, a dairy farmer who was concerned about losing agricultural land to suburbanization.

鈥淚t’s certainly time to look at this again in a modern context,鈥� said Jennifer Bragar, a Portland land-use attorney.

Existing land-use regulations are often a poor fit for innovative approaches to housing, Bragar said.

鈥淭he tiny homes example is one where it’s such a new form of housing that most codes haven’t caught up,鈥� she said. 鈥淎re they manufactured homes? Those kinds of models don’t yet exist for tiny homes, so you’re looking at a new kind of use where you’re having to think about the residential infrastructure needed to house them.鈥�

Zoning quashed an attempt by the city of Portland last year to move the Right 2 Dream Too camp from a lot on West Burnside Street to a city-owned parcel in the Central Eastside. The Central Eastside Industrial Council successfully argued the camp is similar in use to a mass shelter, and is prohibited by industrial zoning that is meant to create an industrial sanctuary within the city.

The Land Use Board of Appeals ruled against the city, reasoning that residential uses are generally prohibited in industrial zones such as the IG1 zone proposed for the R2DToo site. The collection of tents used by R2DToo is legally indistinguishable from a mass shelter structure, according to LUBA.

鈥淚n our view, it cannot possibly be consistent with the purpose and policy of protecting industrial sanctuaries from residential and similar uses incompatible with those sanctuaries, to categorize as an outright permitted use a use that is functionally similar, if not functionally identical, to a use that is prohibited outright in the city’s industrial zones because of its quasi-residential character,鈥� the appeals board explained in its ruling.

The ruling, Bragar said, was a result of the city trying to adapt existing zoning for a use for which it was never designed.

鈥淭he City Council was trying to get pretty creative when the code was pretty clear,鈥� she said. 鈥淭he code says you can’t have this kind of living, so you can’t just call it something else and try to get away with it.鈥�

R2DToo has since moved to another site near the Moda Center.

In Clackamas County’s case, commissioners are attempting to bring land-use regulations in line with the 115th Avenue parcel’s proposed use. The goal is to be the first fully permitted site of its kind, Yaden said.