Winterbrook Planning is hosting a session, Incentivizing Urban Housing in the Border Region, at the Oregon APA annual conference this year! Principal Greg Winterowd and Associate Planner Jaime Crawford will be leading a discussion with the Ontario planning commissioner, and the Executive Housing Authority Director.

Since the mid-19th century, Ontario and Boise have both prospered as Treasure Valley employment, cultural, service and commercial centers. Yet in recent years Ontario’s population and employment growth has stagnated – in stark contrast to burgeoning exurban housing and industrial development in small towns and rural areas across the Snake River in Idaho. This session will examine how Ontario has addressed fundamental land use and tax differences between Oregon and Idaho, in an effort to secure its fair share of regional housing development. Executive Housing Authority Director, Kristy Rodriguez, and Ontario Planning Commissioner and community activist, Cydney Cooke, will share their experiences as housing development champions in Oregon’s Border Region. This session will show how grass-roots community efforts, in combination with adopted housing measures (enabled by a 2020-2021 LCDC housing grant), have substantially increased housing production for all income levels in Ontario.

We are excited to be attending the first in-person OAPA conference in years! As well as hosting our own session, we are looking forward to seeing sessions that cover everything from tribal economic development to downtown revitalization and parking reform (a hot topic this year). Click here to view the conference schedule.