Oregon is told that opening farm and forest land to development will produce homes people can afford. These are the places where the land was opened. Every case here is drawn from a public record.
The case for opening farm and forest land is that it will produce homes people can afford. These are the places where Oregon actually opened it. Every one of them is on the public record, and not one of them is affordable housing.
Each case is drawn where the public record places it. Where a record names a community but no address — which is most of them, because land use appeals turn on criteria rather than addresses — the pin sits on the community and is drawn hollow to say so. 1 case whose record names only a county is not pinned at all; it is listed in the case record below.
Between 1994 and 2021, 36% of the more than 19,000 new dwellings approved in Oregon's exclusive farm use zones were replacement dwellings — a provision that permits a teardown outright, with no land use decision for a neighbour to appeal.
Every case is drawn from a cited public record, and dollar figures state whether they are a sale, an assessment, or an asking price. Land use records are appealed and amended; verify against county and court records before legal or filing use.
| Case | County | Community | Zoning | Scale | Outcome | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A 1920 farmhouse, and what replaced it | Washington | Forest Grove | Exclusive Farm Use (EFU) | 7,378 sq ft | Built and standing; resold August 2025 | The Oregonian / OregonLive, 2025-03-21 |
| A nine-suite inn, permitted as a farm dwelling | Yamhill | Dundee | Exclusive Farm Use 40-acre minimum (EF-40), high-value farmland | 8,200 sq ft 9 suites | Approved 2022; LUBA affirmed; Court of Appeals reversed 2023; Oregon Supreme Court remanded July 2025; county re-approved January 2026 | Capital Press, 2025-07-03 |
| A manufactured home, replaced by nine suites | Yamhill | Carlton | Exclusive Farm Use 80-acre minimum (EF-80) | 10,520 sq ft 9 suites | Permitted 2022, opened for business August 2023; LUBA remanded December 2025 | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2022-090, 2025-12-17 |
| Ten bedrooms, nine baths, two miles from Ashland | Jackson | Ashland | Exclusive Farm Use (EFU), expressly not high-value farmland | 11,000 sq ft | Built 2002 and standing; a later application to convert it to a church was denied | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2008-076, 2008-12-23 |
| The building became the reason to rezone the forest | Josephine | Hugo | Woodlot Resource, 20-acre minimum — forest land since 1973 | 11,000 sq ft | Approved; LUBA affirmed | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 94-048, 1994-09-02 |
| The farm plan was never implemented | Deschutes | Sisters | Exclusive Farm Use (EFU), Metolius Deer Winter Range and Wildlife Area overlays | 6,000 sq ft | Rejected as a private park in 2015; approved in 2018 recast as a church use | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2015-034, 2015-08-17 |
| A 50-room hotel, modeled on Napa | Yamhill | Dundee | Agriculture/Forestry Large Holding, zoned Exclusive Farm Use (EFU) | — 50 suites | LUBA remanded 2007; the Court of Appeals reversed on the Goal 3 and Goal 14 exception question; not built | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2006-157, 2007-03-21 |
| $24,000 of filberts, $125,000 of events | Yamhill | Newberg | Exclusive Farm (EF-20) | — | LUBA remanded 2019; the Court of Appeals reversed and remanded in 2020; LUBA remanded again | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2018-144, 2019-08-02 |
| A golf clubhouse on farm land at the city's edge | Curry | Port Orford | Exclusive Farm Use (EFU) | 10,000 sq ft | LUBA remanded | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2015-006, 2015-05-15 |
| A barn exempt from building code, because it was agricultural | Clackamas | Beavercreek | AG/Forest (AG/F), a mixed farm and forest zone | 3,000 sq ft | LUBA remanded 2024; the Court of Appeals affirmed; LUBA remanded again June 2025 | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2024-015, 2024-07-19 |
| A wedding pavilion, filed as a home occupation | Douglas | Umpqua | Exclusive Farm Use – Cropland (FC), a statutory EFU zone | 4,000 sq ft | LUBA remanded 2011; a later approval was affirmed in 2013 | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2010-106, 2011-04-04 |
| 950 homes on 1,970 acres of farm land | Deschutes | Cline Buttes | Exclusive Farm Use, within the destination resort overlay zone | — 380 suites | Approved repeatedly and still contested; the county re-approved in July 2025 and appeals continue | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2018-140, 2019-06-21 |
| 614 acres of forest, bought from the Forest Service | Deschutes | Sunriver | Forest, with wildlife area and destination resort overlays | — 95 suites | Approved by the county in 2016; LUBA rejected the approval; the Court of Appeals reversed and remanded in 2017 | Oregon Court of Appeals, 285 Or App 45, 2017-04-19 |
| Ten cabins and a lodge, called a guest ranch | Deschutes | Sisters | Exclusive Farm Use (EFU) | — | Approved; LUBA affirmed. Revived twenty-one years later when the Court of Appeals held the 2002 use had been initiated. | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2002-093, 2002-10-29 |
| A 6,800 sq ft room for livestock sales | Klamath | Klamath Falls | Exclusive Farm Use – Cropland (EFU-C) | 6,800 sq ft | LUBA remanded | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 93-146, 1994-01-20 |
| Eighteen thousand square feet, with a bowling alley | Marion | not in the record | Special Agriculture (SA), a county zone implementing Goal 3 and ORS 215.283 | 18,000 sq ft 7 suites | Built 1992 and standing. A later bed-and-breakfast permit was denied and LUBA affirmed the denial. | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2018-137, 2019-02-28 |
| Built without a permit, then approved after the fact | Lane | Eugene | Impacted Forest Land (F-2) | 5,200 sq ft | Approved after the fact as a residential accessory structure; LUBA affirmed in part and remanded in part 2016; Court of Appeals affirmed 2017. Never removed. | Land Use Board of Appeals, No. 2016-029, 2016-10-11 |
| Layer | Title | Agency | Source | Retrieved |
|---|---|---|---|---|
counties | Oregon County Boundaries (TIGER 2024) | US Census Bureau, TIGER/Line | source | 2026-04-30 |