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About Medford mail tribune. (Medford, Or.) 1909-1989 | View Entire Issue (March 24, 1960)
University's 1 1 ' Uj S if iafefflri.rfltrlfiliiA T - ffiii ihwiiF -'"r'tbui i m Bureau of Municipal Research Completes 25-Year Planning Project Lane County Plan Launched Without Public Notice (Editor's noie: This is another in the series of ar tciles on research and pub lic service activities of the stale's tax-supported col leges and university. The tides ori research and pub by Mrs. Wilma Morrison - for the state system of high er education. The following article discusses the activi ties of the bureau of mu nicipal research of the Uni vesir f Oregon.) By MIS. WILMA MORRISON Early in March the bureau of municipal research at Uni versity ef Oregon chalked up what planning officials grou4 the state regard as the most significant advance of the jit 10 years toward effec tive community development. Th reason for rejoicing is t 23-year transportation and industrial (land-use) planning project for Central Lane coun ty, launched virtually with out jublic notice, by 25 fed eral, state and local officials afe a Jugene meeting. Herman Kehrli, director of the bureau of municipal re search, said the cooperative project is news because,' for the first time, it brings to gether with county and local agencies, the forces and funds of two federal agen cies, the bureau of public roads and the federal hous ing and home finance agency. Had Stronger Words Other city officials and community planning men had stronger words for this coop erative survey which the bu reau has master-minded. One professional planner said, "Getting the state highway commission (which, administ ers the federal public roads funds) to come in, makes what has happened in Lane county almost the millennium as far as urban planning in Oregon is concerned." He added, "We have never wanted to dupli cate their (the highway com mission's ) work; we just want to work with them." Kehrli said he now sees a definite trend toward cooper ation between highway plan ners and community planners who, in the past, "tended to meet only where they clash ed." In the Lane county project $10,000 of public roads funds and $13,000 from the federal housing and home finance ag ency have been committed, along with another $5,000 from the Central Lane coun ty planning commission. Illustrate Coordination Bringing together the fre quently opposing forces of highways and land-use plan ning, of state government and local government, to plan Lane county's development, is an illustration of the catalytic p-the coordinating role that has become an increasingly important part of the univers ity bureau's work. It would be hard to over emphasize the influence on the state over the past 28 Jears of this university-based, fact-finding bureau organiza tion. Any- historian could find in the more than 500 research studies and how-to-do-it guides it has published, and in the annual files of questions it answers, the human drama as well as the legal record of a changing Oregon. In the lit erally hundreds of legislative jneasures its staff has writ ten er helped write, the bu reau has been istrumental in shaping everything from taxes to traffic, from reserve funds retirement law. Vhen federal funds were made available for urban planning four years ago, the bureau at the university was the agency selected to admin ister the state-wide program. Currently a special staff of 12 is heading the urban re newal work in 34 towns, and the federal grants involved run to about $400,000. These are a few in. the long cata logue of activities since estab lishment of this urban re search and service agency in 1932. Kehrli has headed the bu reau ever since it was set up as a means of serving Ore gon's urban communities in the way that agricultural ex periment stations and agri cultural extension were serv ing the rural areas. His second role, as executive of the League of Oregon Cities, has involved him in the activat ingthe legislative side of municipal and county govern ment. As the times have changed, the bureau's focus and scope have changed. Use of Word Fringe The word "fringe" which once meant something that waved from the top half of a surrey or the bottom half of a chorus girl, has taken on a hyphen and a new meaning. As "fringe-area" or "urban fringe," it now covers a com plex of population conditions which A. M. 'Westling, plan ning and public works con sultant on the bureau staff, DIRECTOR HERMAN KEHRLI Incorporation, Annexation Lead List says "constitute the single the 1920's encroachment of greatest problem among Ore- the state on the city father's gon's towns." Oregon's population in creased by some 255,000 be tween 1950 and 1958 from 1,251,000 to 1,777,000, and most of the increase was on the edges of towns and cities. The head count within Eu gene and Springfield city lim its, for example, is 64,000 but when the. spreading fringe of the two towns is included it is 110,000. It is the financial, the gov ernmental, and the timing problems involved in getting basic urban services streets, schools, sewers, power, water, police, and all the rest into these suddenly expanded areas that is straining mu nicipal resources and working the bureau staff overtime. Serious Side Effect And, in back of it all, the automobile which is increas ing much faster than people. (There were 13 per cent more people in Oregon in 1958 than in 1950 but there were 21 per cent more cars.) Today the car problem of control of traffic, and the loc al stake in the new state gas tax look like child's play to city officials and the bureau. Today the questions born of a community on wheels are not confined to parking and traf fic. They are the complica tions of the growing commut er fringe, the spread of com mercial concerns into the sub urbs, with its serious side ef fect the threatened death of the downtown business dis tricts. Some of the hundreds of questions the bureau, in its clearing house role, tries to answer, are as new as the times. Others are as old as human nature itself. How can the town of Board- man, doomed to be flooded out of existence by the John Day Dam, retain its legal sta tus after it ceases to exist, in order to receive damages from the government with which to build new facilities at another location? Could the partial flooding of Arlington by the same dam Corner of 4th and Front Street 4 Million Gain Noted by Bank The United States National Bank of Portland, with 73 banking offices in Oregon, has recorded a $4 million gain in deposits since the compar able call date in March, 1959, it was reported by the comp troller of currency. Deposits at the Medford branch totaled $21,825,201.19, compared with $10,848,544.08, according to Allan Perry, manager. Total deposits in the bank's local offices reached $793, 840,321, compared with $790, 025,949 last year. In the past year the bank has opened new branches at Baker, Halfway and Warren ton and Portland. PICNIC WORRELL'S READY-TO-EAT MAIL TRIBUNE, Medford, Or. C Thursday, March 24, 1960 come under the federal defin tion of "blighted area" and thus make that town eligible for urban renewal funds? Legal Complications What of the legal complica tions of an incorporated town, Brookings, when, not so many years ago, it louna tnai us sewer and water systems were the property of an individual, the former owner of the town site? Does a municipal govern ment have the autority to reg ulate the tone and volume of locomotive whistles? Can it require that horses on its streets be shod with rubber shoes to save pavement wear and tear? How to draw a model dog ordinance that will please everyone including the dogs? Lloyd Keefe who was eight years a planning director for the Portland planning com mission and is now executive of Downtown Planning, Inc., gives the university-based bu reau of municipal research chief credit 'for organizing county-wide and metropolitan area planning organization including the Multnomah county planning commission. Complex Problems "Here is a pool of govern mental experts to serve the state particularly at the local level where it is hardest to eet experienced officials," he said. "They can spread the word the standards and methods of good government- at the local level where, to put it bluntly, we have the least competence, but where the problems are the most complex." - Among the many education al services the bureau renders to better local governments are the annual police schools seven of them over the state and the training sessions for city and county finance officers. "Organization and training i of police is the hardest part of municipal, administration," Kehrli says. He has been try ing for 10 years to get the state to provide a full-time man for this, and believes such a capable person spend ing all his time on the job "would be the biggest contri bution to local government that could be made someone to make a real professional organization out of the police of smaller cities." Which local, issues carry the most emotional dynamite? Incorporation, Annexation After 30 years in the middle-man's seat, Kehrli says the questions of incorporation and annexation are the ones that split communities. Zoning is a runner-up for honors in set ting neighbors at each other's throats. The greatest changes in Oregon towns? The swing to professional administration. All cities over 10,000 except Portland now have managers, the bureau director said, "I can remember when many towns elected their chiefs of police, municipal judges, city attorneys." Finally, the bureau staff sees a pronounced change in philosophy in Oregon towns since World War II the feel ing that the state is going to grow, that the larger towns are going to grow in spite of anything and that local lead ership has to be more than a retroactive scramble to catdt up with the present. SCORN Eft Always Fresh QUALITY EGGS The Mrs. Housewife Says... "Eggs add Taste Appeal to any Meal IF they are (CORNER Eggs. 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