FILE - A former grass seed farm next to Hillsboro's high-tech cluster, pictured Feb. 27, 2023.
Kate Davidson / OPB
Several weeks after a public meeting that drew both ardent support and opposition over the future of hundreds of acres of rural farmland north of Hillsboro, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek has made a decision: The governor will not use her executive power to expand the city’s urban growth boundary.
Earlier this fall, Kotek kicked off the process to bring 373 acres of rural reserves into Hillsboro’s urban growth boundary through a temporary authority lawmakers granted her during the 2023 state legislative session. That power is set to expire at the end of 2024.
Usually, expanding urban boundaries into rural farmland is a lengthy process that involves input from the public. But Senate Bill 4, which lawmakers passed in 2023, gave the governor the temporary authority to bypass that process.
A map of the area Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek had proposed adding to the Hillsboro urban growth boundary, as part of an effort to recruit a semiconductor hub to the site.
Courtesy city of Hillsboro
In a statement released Friday, her office said the governor has thus far been clear “that she takes the executive authority conferred by Senate Bill 4 seriously.”
“Her office has applied a thoughtful — and critical — lens to opportunities for urban growth boundary expansion for the purpose of bolstering our state’s semiconductor industry advancements,” the statement said.
“The Governor believes that for the long term success of Oregon’s economy, there may be a need for more industrial land outside of existing UGBs, but the constraints of Senate Bill 4 limit her authority at this time.”
Related: Groups spar over protecting farms or making way for semiconductor industry in Hillsboro
Oregon is technically still in the running to receive one of three national semiconductor technology research centers, which elected officials had hoped would position the state as a leader in the industry and bring a steady stream of high-tech jobs to future generations of Oregonians. But Kotek only has until the end of this year to act.
“With two of the three NSTC facilities already determined and the third not yet announced,” Friday’s statement reads, “Governor Kotek believes that there is not a legal path forward to bring additional acreage into the Hillsboro UGB using the authorities outlined in Senate Bill 4, Sections 10 and 11.”
Politicians argued the site they selected was an ideal location because of its close proximity to other semiconductor manufacturing and supply chain businesses.
But opposing groups argued that there is already plenty of unused industrial land in and around Hillsboro. And they said that the governor had not made a strong enough case for needing to bring 373 acres of land into the city’s urban growth boundary for semiconductor research.
