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Climate-Friendly & Equitable Communities

We are addressing Climate-Friendly and Equitable Communities (CFEC) rules adopted by the Oregon Land Conservation and Development Commission in July 2022 to help meet state goals to reduce climate pollution, especially from transportation.
Community Planning coordinates with local and state planning efforts and incorporate public and community-based organization involvement. We maintain the County’s Comprehensive Plan and update the Community Development Code and Community Plans.

In March of 2020, Governor Kate Brown issued Executive Order 20-04 directing state agencies to take actions to reduce and regulate greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the impacts of climate change while also centering the needs of Oregon’s most vulnerable communities. In response, the Oregon Land Conservation and Development Commission developed Climate-Friendly and Equitable Communities (CFEC) rules, for cities and metropolitan areas to help meet these goals through changes to local transportation and housing planning systems.

Parking Reform Public Hearings

Ordinance No. 903 amends Washington County’s Transportation System Plan, Community Plans and the Community Development Code to implement new parking regulations that are a part of this state initiative. At their Oct. 15 hearing the Washington County Board of County Commissioners voted to adopt the ordinance which will go into effect Nov. 14.

Climate-Friendly Equitable Communities

Overview

Ordinance No. 903 implements parking requirement changes for new developments in urban areas. These changes should help meet state goals to reduce climate pollution, especially from transportation.


Parking changes apply only to urban unincorporated areas and include:

  • Remove minimum parking requirements
  • Remove minimum parking requirements on residential streets
  • Add more tree canopy requirements for surface parking lots greater than 0.5 acre
  • Update and standardize parking maximum requirements
  • Add minimum ADA-accessible parking for larger developments

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Learn More

Map of Washington County parcels with reduced parking requirements (PDF 2.12 MB)
Guidance to implement Climate-Friendly Equitable Communities parking reform requirements (PDF 313.43 KB)

DLCD Climate-Friendly and Equitable Communities

ODOT Planning for Climate-Friendly & Equitable Communities and technical guidance

FAQs

Proposed regulations will apply to new development and redevelopment in the urban unincorporated areas inside the Metro Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) only.

In new residential areas, the removal of minimum off-street and on-street parking requirements means that developers will have more flexibility in how much parking they provide. This change will not stop developers from providing parking but will allow market-demand to determine appropriate amounts of parking.

The impact to established neighborhoods may be less direct. The new regulations will affect areas or individual lots that are redeveloped. The regulations could make it possible for development of individual neighborhood properties that in the past could not be developed because they did not meet minimum parking standards.

We already have requirements that limit the maximum number of parking spaces for certain types of development. New state rules provide a new set of parking maximum requirements for us to follow. To meet this requirement, we are applying a single set of parking maximum requirements to all urban unincorporated areas.

Parking lots, especially larger ones, will see significant changes. The addition of tree canopy requirements means that more trees will be planted in parking lots over 0.5 acres.

A 0.5-acre parking lot holds 40-60 vehicles, depending on design. For building larger than 65,000 square feet, parking lots would not be allowed any larger than the building floor area, regardless of the number of parking spaces in them.

ADA parking spaces are tied to the number of parking spaces provided and that will continue to apply.

To ensure parking facilities are inclusive and accessible to people with disabilities, we have included a new rule to create a parking minimum of at least one ADA-accessible parking space, even if no parking spaces are required for certain development types:

  • Multi-family housing over three stories 
  • Institutional buildings (churches, schools, etc.) 
  • Commercial buildings over 5,000 square feet 
  • Industrial buildings over 25,000 square feet

Contact(s)