Oregon Learns A Hard Lesson

On November 7, 2000 the voters of Oregon passed Ballot Measure 7 by a margin of 53 percent. The measure amends the Oregon Constitution and requires state and local governments to pay full compensation to a property owner, if a law or regulation reduces any of the property’s value. The planners could not believe that the property rights activists and developers had so easily hoodwinked Oregon's voters. It was even more humiliating because Oregon is often touted as a national model of progressive state-mandated land use planning. What you could not find within this painful lament was any culpability -- which was exactly the reason it passed. No planner was willing to admit that they helped pass it. Why did it pass? People were tired of heavy-handed government planners.