Bend sees more million dollar sales - as affordable housing needs grow

             As the conversation over affordable Bend housing continues, home prices are also escalating at a rate that may outpace any near term solutions.
            Data compiled by Beacon Appraisal Group for its monthly market report shows that the median price of a Bend single family home on less than an acre was $640,000, the third consecutive month above $600,000 although below the high monthly median of $651,00 in April.
            Perhaps more remarkable are the sales of homes at more than $1 million. There were 341 homes closed at $1 million or more for the 12 months through June of 2021, a 158% increase of the comparable midway point of 2020.
            The trajectory of the million dollar sales has more than quintupled the 67 at that range recorded in just the three years since midway 2018.
            As a percentage of all sales, those of $1 million or more accounted for only 2.6% in 2018, then rose to 4.7% in 2019; and 5.7% in 2020 before leaping to 12.3% for the 12 months ending June 20, 2021.
          Although the upward arc of regional housing sales has yet to show any weakening, it’s instructive to balance single month prices over a 12-month stretch.
            By that measure, Bend’s median single price for homes on less than an acre over the 12-months from July of 2020 through June of 2021 was $567,000, a jump of 23% over the $460,000 recorded for the comparable 2019 through 2020 period.
            The median price for the same quarter of the two years shows a greater increase, from $464,000 for the three month median in 2020 against $640,000 in 2021 – a 38% increase.

            To the north in Redmond, the region’s second largest housing market, the June median price was $451,000. For the 12 months the median was $374,000, 14% above the same 12 months of 2020. The quarter to quarter price of 2020 and 2021 rose 33% from $334,000 for the 2^nd quarter of 2020 to $443,000 in 2021.
            With Bend homes going into sales contract in last than a week on the market in the past several months, and often closing above listing price, the path for more substantial affordable workforce housing in the city is difficult.
            Bend is not unlike other smaller to mid-sized municipalities, many in the West, where attractive outdoor recreational opportunities combine with other lifestyle amenities to change the character of those once included in the “last best place” category.
            There are few undiscovered western gems left, with such towns as Whitefish, Bozeman and Livingston, MT and Prescott and Flagstaff, AZ and even Washington’s more remote Methow Valley straining under an influx of new part and fulltime residents.
            One possibility for more dedicated affordable housing lies in the distant horizon after approval of special legislation that would allow Bend to bring 260 acres of land bordering the southeast limits into its urban growth boundary.
            In theory House Bill 3318, which makes an exception to usual state land use procedures, could add land for as many as 800 affordable housing units on 20 of the 260 acres, with a 50-year deed restriction. It would also restrict 12 of the acres to anyone making 60% of the area’s median income, among other provisions.
            Also in the early stages of development in southeast Bend is what is known as the Stevens Road tract, 375 acres now held by Lands Bend Corp., a development group with several local projects whose principals include former California Republican Congressman Gary Miller.
            Lands Bend acquired the property from the Oregon Department of State Land for $22 million in the Spring of 2020. That acreage already lies within Bend’s urban growth boundary.
            The Bend Planning Commission is reviewing the company’s preliminary master plan that would provide for more than 1,700 housing units, about 650 of those single family homes, 359 townhomes and approximately 700 multi-family units.

Bend’s affordability challenge

            In a July report the Bend City Council announced the city had a total of 3,942 new housing either completed, under construction or in planning review in the period 2019-2021, which the report said exceeded a council goal of 3,000 units.
            The number included 1.976 finished units, 1,406 under construction and 560 being reviewed.
            The numbers appeared to give city leaders some encouragement in the continuing housing crunch. But another study by the city unveiled at a recent public online webinar shows affordability remains a major issue in relation to local median income.
            US Census data for the period 2015-2019 shows Bend's median household income at $65,662.
            On July 22, city officials held an information webinar to explain how the city plans comply with new Oregon legislation, HB 2001, which mandates that municipalities provide for multi-family units such as apartments, condominiums and townhomes be allowed in areas zoned for single family homes.
            A chart presented in the webinar shows that a household earning an adjusted median income of $120,600 could in theory afford a home priced at the maximum $566,980. That would leave the buyer short by $84,020 to purchase the median priced home that solid in April, according to Beacon Appraisal’s statistics as drawn from the MLS of Central Oregon.
            It would take an income of $64,300 to buy a home priced at a maximum $299,000, as noted in the city’s affordability chart. It would be a longshot if someone were fortunate enough to find one of the only 72 homes that closed at less than $300,000 out of 2,755 total sales for the 12 months that ended in April.
            And there were no closings at less than $300,000 in April.

 

Western reservoirs at historic water lows

             Central Oregon’s largest reservoir is draining ever more rapidly, resulting in an announcement July 7 that all dam releases could end within six weeks.
            The news from the North Unit Irrigation District came only a few days after yet more cuts in water delivery to its member growers who account for 55% of the region’s most productive cash crops, including 40% of global hybrid variety carrot seed.
            In a July 7 letter, NUID manager Josh Bailey, wrote that barring significant rainfall Wickiup Reservoir, the region’s largest impoundment which provides about 70% of its water to the irrigation district, would reach, “the artificial ending pool of 2,500 acre-feet on or around August 18.
            That  could mean that by August 20 the district’s ability to direct water in canals fed by Wickiup discharges into Haystack Reservoir, which in turn serves to distribute water to growers.
The district also receives some water from the Crooked River but that would not save the irrigation season.
            Wickiup is at an alltime low for this time in July in the reservoir’s 75 year history, and the present situation marks another year of declining storage due to lower spring snowpacks and related runoff into tributaries that feed the upper Deschutes River.

Source: Washington Post

            Throughout the western and southwest states the drought is taking its toll on many reservoirs that are experiencing record lows similar to Wickiup.
            Lake Mead is reporterdly at its lowest level of 35% capacity since it was created by the construction of Hoover Dam in the 1930s. Lake Powell, farther up the Colorado River, is similarly at historic lows of 34% capacity since it was filled after construction of the Glen Canyon Dam.
            Reservoirs in California have also drained to perilous levels, as dramatically illustrated by aerial photos of Shasta Lake in the northern part of the state.
            A analysis the first week of July of more than a dozen California reservoirs showed severely low water. The continuing water shortage could have substantial future consequences for some California municipalities as well as impact agricultural production of major food crops for the nation.

DROUGHT: The glass lower than half empty made even worse with a June heatwave

             Everybody is talking about it, the weather that is.
            The first week of June began chilly as some nightly temperatures dropped into the 30s and days barely made it out of the 50s. And several days were marked with heavier rain and higher humidity.
            Then came a dramatic change, as the final week of the month brought Bend’s hottest day on record June 30 at 107 degrees, preceded in the previous two days by 102 and 104 readings with heat advisories daily going into the July 4^th holiday.
            Early July also saw much of the center of Oregon from the California line to Bend and Deschutes County rated either in “extreme” of “exceptional” drought, the latter being the federal Natural Resource and Conservation Service’s most hazardous parched category.

            Several newer wildfires broke out after a spectacular band of thunder and lightning cells moved across the region the final week of June. Together with larger fires in the Warm Springs area north of Bend and in northern California, Bend’s “smoke season” has gotten an early start.
            The continuing drought exacerated by a heatwave have forced regional irrigation districts to cut back water distribution from the Deschutes as natural flows continue to drop.
            On July 2 the Central Oregon Irrigation District, which manages senior water rights for 45,000 acres in the basin, announced it would be cutting back distribution to member irrigators.
            “The flows in the Deschutes River are continuing to drop and with that the COID delivery rates must decrease,” COID management informed members in a June 18 notice posted on its website.
            “Currently we are at a 65-70% delivery rate in our system. The river flows are being closely monitored and we will keep you updated as the flows and the COID deliveries decrease.”
            The COID notice said the district would begin providing 100 cubic feet per second (cfs) of its entitled senior rights to the North Unit Irrigation District, Arnold and Lone Pine districts that manage junior water rights in the basin.
            Already the North Unit had begun major reductions of water flowing to its members, who grow 55% of the region’s most productive cash crops on nearly 60,000 acres in Jefferson County north of Bend.
            The level of Wickiup Reservoir, which stores water for the North Unit is at all time lows for this time of year at 18% of capacity. On July 4 that translated to only 33,157 acre feet, 54% less than at this time in 2020, also a drought year, and 74% less than average.
    Note in the real time "Hydromet" teacup graphic available from the US Bureau of Reclamation that Crane Prairie Reservoir, which impounds water for COID, is in the best shape of any reservoir in the region. That reflects COID's standing as a senior water rights holder in the basin. 

            In a July 1 announcement on its website the NUID manager began with a dire observation:
            “It pains me to write this letter, as I am fully aware of the difficult situation that we find ourselves in,” began general manager Josh Bailey.
            The announcement then continued to inform irrigators that in an emergency meeting June 30 the board of directors had approved another reduction of water distribution. That follows an earlier ramping down only days earlier on June 21.
            The latest NUID reduction emphasizes the dramatic and accelerating basin conditions, contradicting the district's early predictions that it hoped to maintain a 1 acre-foot distribution of its Deschutes River rights and .50 acres for water from the Crooked River throughout the season.

            In its earlier June cutback, the district reduced distribution to .90 acre foot per acre (af/pa) for the Deschutes water right and 0.40 ac/pa for the Crooked River impoundment at Haystack Reservoir in Jefferson County. Starting July 3, the distribution decreases to 0.80 ac/pa and 0.50 respectively.
            The goal, Bailey wrote, is to reduce immediate system demand and, “extend the available water through the end of August.”
            Although difficult to quantify, the drain on water availability in the greater Deschutes watershed is attributed to a confluence of several other factors joining drought conditions that have existed for several years with escalating and detrimental effect.
            For the past several irrigation years irrigators have been bound by terms of a Habitat Conservation Plan, negotiated by the districts, federal agencies, conservation groups and other stakeholders. The HCP agreement regulates river flows to protect the Oregon spotted frog, listed on the federal Endangered Species Act.

 Equipment sits idle as fields dry out

            Together with lower snowpacks, the requirement that extra water be released into the river system at certain times in the frog’s life cycle has resulted in some loss of storage in area reservoirs.
             Even with cooperation among COID, NUID and the other smaller basin irrigation districts there is the overarching issue of balance between senior and junior water rights holders, one that exists throughout the structure of western water law.
            In most western states water rights dating back to the 1800s are based on the doctrine of prior appropriation, simply translated as “first in time, first in line.”
            In Central Oregon, the water rights aggregated through the Central Oregon Irrigation District in the Bend area were recorded and used on the land ahead of those implemented later by the neighboring farmers and ranchers to the north in Jefferson County.
            The paradox emerges when the North Unit providing nurturing water for typically higher value crop production has a lesser claim to the resource than COID, with fewer cash crops.
            In some cases, smaller operations are put in a position of growing hay or alfalfa in  order to maintain the lower taxes on land zoned for exclusive farm use (EFU). Also a factor is the “beneficial use” requirement that a water right must be used at least one of the past consecutive five years, giving rise to the warning to “use it or lose it.”
            Irrigators in districts who do not plan to grow crops in a  given year have the option to place to temporarily return their rights to improve river flows, or to effectively lease it to others in their district. But thus far few appear to have made that decision this season.
            COID’s gesture to release 100 cfs of its water right to benefit NUID users is no doubt welcome but will likely provide little significant relief for Jefferson County growers.
            Already many have either scaled back this year’s crops by fallowing some fields, or entirely thrown in the towel for the growing season. Some say that even trying to plant and maintain non-cash cover crops to staunch erosion will be too costly.

Measuring irrigation water: From cubic foot per second to acre feet 

    It may be easier to understand how much water is used for irrigation by doing the calculations, starting with a cubic foot per second, or cfs, diversion.
    A cubic foot per second is the amount of water that would pass a given point in one second, or7.48 gallons. An acre foot is the amount of water needed to cover one acre to a depth of onefoot.
     In one hour, a 1 cfs diversion would cover an acre of land with one inch of water. In one day or 24 hours, then, 1 cfs would cover one acre with water two-feet deep—or 2 acre feet of water.
     Therefore, 2 acre feet per day is equal to a 1 cfs irrigation diversion.A 1 cfs irrigation diversion would result in 448.8 gallons in one minute (usually rounded to 450gallons per minute, or gpm). That would amount to 26,928 gallons in an hour, 648,000 in a dayand 236,520,000 gallons in a year.

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Another drought season in the works: Low snowpack and reservoirs

 Snowpack, water and endangered species - A complicated calculus

Fact Sheet of Draft EIS for the Deschutes Basin HCP

https://www.fws.gov/oregonfwo/Documents/DeschutesHCP/deisFR/mtgs/Deschutes%20Fact%20Sheet%20-%20WEB.pdf

Complete DRAFT HCP as of August 2019

https://www.fws.gov/oregonfwo/Documents/DeschutesHCP/deisFR/DBHCP%20Entire%20Document%20August%202019.pdf

A Timeline of the Spotted Frog ESA listing in the Deschutes Basin

https://bendisbetter.blogspot.com/2016/02/spotted-frog-esa-listing-creates.html