Resort bill for Sunriver area would revise nightly rental rules

Proposed state legislation related to a Sunriver area project is spurring discussion as to whether targeted bills should be used to provide flexibility under Oregon’s decades-old land use goals.

 The owner of Sunriver Resort has proposed a new community, at present known as Pine Forest, of 925 homes and home sites on 617 acres south of its existing Caldera Springs community and across from Crosswater, also developed by the resort owner.

 As a tradeoff for removing deed restrictions requiring nightly rental units at Caldera Springs and Pine Forest, Sunriver developers would contribute approximately $3,000,000 over a number of years. The original intent was for the payments to support a South County Sanitary Authority in the area which has been plagued by excessive nitrates resulting from septic systems.
            State and county regulations require that resorts provide nightly rental units indexed to the number of homes. State law requires a ratio of one nightly unit for each 2.5 homes, but DeschutesCounty’s more restrictive code mandates a 1:2ratio.

The state's land use Goal 8 that applies to resorts larger than 160 acres also requires a minimum of 150 nightly lodging units and that 50 of those be built before other home sites can be sold. It also stipulates that 50 of the remaining 100 units be bonded for construction within five years and the other 50 within 10 years.

Sunriver officials have maintained bonding fees might be better spent on improvements that could benefit the larger community. They also say that deed restrictions requiring units be available on a rental program for 45 weeks each year effectively deter potential buyers. And lenders view the units as income properties with tighter loan requirements, rather than owner-occupied homes.

A Sunriver spokesman has noted that only about 14 percent of existing homes in the resort are fulltime residences, leaving 86 percent that are potentially available for rentals.  It’s not clear how many of that percentage are available on a nightly rental program.

With its proposed Pine Forest project on the drawing boards, Sunriver officials had decided to upgrade their 40-year-old treatment system to accommodate their existing communities and new development. They say the state Department of Environmental Quality approached them regarding some way to also participate in solving the nitrate issues in the area before proceeding with improvements.

Sunriver has said it needs to move ahead with upgrading the system whether or not the larger community based sanitary authority is created. The timing will depend on a decision by DEQ and the fate of HB 3347.

Even if nightly rental restrictions are waived for Sunriver’s projects, other provisions of the state’s land use Goal 8 applying to resorts would remain, including at least 50 percent open space. HB 3347 would limit lot sizes in Pine Forest to 7,000 square feet and homes to 2,000 square feet.

The Sunriver Owners Association board of directors has raised a number of questions regarding the legislation, sponsored by Rep. Gene Whisnant, R-Sunriver. Many of the questions listed by the board address economic impacts of new development on existing Sunriver lodging facilities along with traffic impacts and demands on fire, public safety, schools and other services.

The board’s list also asked for details regarding a sanitary authority’s voting structure and powers including bonding, taxes and fees, and employment as well as information related to the existing Sunriver treatment system including planned improvements and the costs; funding sources and timing of construction.

Oregon's Goal 8: land planning related to resorts

HB 3347: Bill to revise nightly rental requirements