North Plains City Council Makes Needed Course Corrections

Friends of Smart Growth serves North Plains and the surrounding area. Our grassroots efforts aren’t focused on personal profits. We’re focused on improving the quality of life in our historic town and community while providing opportunity for growth that aligns with our agricultural surroundings and sound fiscal management. That’s why we’re highlighting the work that the current North Plains City Council is undertaking to course-correct after years of intense focus and expense to grow excessively.

Unfortunately, before they left office in 2024 the previous Council obstructed the new Councilors’ abilities to govern. In their final days in office, the prior City Council hired as city manager the architect of North Plains excessive urban growth boundary expansion. They also rewrote Council rules to give the city manager significant powers like controlling agendas. That same city manager consolidated power in himself by taking over important positions at the city, like Acting Finance Director to Acting Planning Director. This unnecessary consolidation has made it more difficult to fill his responsibilities since he resigned in June. And the prior City Council wrote into that city manager’s employment contract a large severance package that the incoming City Council would be forced to pay if he left the position. Your current Council was left with a mess to clean up.

But your people-powered Council is working hard to address those issues. After 4 years of not producing an audit, the City Council insisted on fiscal responsibility and North Plains’ auditors are nearing completion of the 2022 audit, and will progress from there.

Until now, North Plains’ Urban Renewal grant program was inefficiently and inconsistently applied. That’s why the Council acting as the Urban Renewal Agency contracted Portland’s Tiberius Solutions to establish a new system to ensure an easy, efficient, fair grant application process for North Plains’ businesses.

The Council is also working to maintain connection to North Plains historic past and small town nature by undertaking much needed maintenance for Jessie Mays Community Center. 

As the Council moves the city towards the scale-appropriate, responsible growth North Plains residents voted for, the same interests that tried to turn North Plains into Northwest Hillsboro are working hard to undermine North Plains’ government. Friends of Smart Growth is stepping up for our community. 

Please join us in improving the quality of life and affordability of our “City to the Sunset”. friendsofsmartgrowth.org

Volunteer to canvas, write for us, host events. Run for City Council. If you can donate to help us afford mailers and more. 

In partnership,

Friends of Smart Growth