Outside the Box Should be the Norm: Rethinking Red Tape and Welcoming New Oregonians.
When we’re being threatened on so many fronts, creative solutions must be on the table.
I cannot think of another 18-month period of my life that had so many natural disasters strike Oregon (Umatilla’s intense flooding, pandemic, Labor Day fire storms, Valentine’s Day ice storm, and June’s heat dome). Oregon needs to apply solutions on all fronts to emerge stronger, healthier, and more able to bounce back from future shocks (whether a subduction zone earthquake, a recession, or some other possible threat). A few underdiscussed solutions deserve more attention.
First, we can build a stronger and more vital Oregon by looking beyond our borders. Outside of Oregon, there are people and ideas looking for a new home and we’re a perfect place for them to reside. As the US withdraws from Afghanistan and the Taliban assert their absolute control, Afghan refugees need to flee their homeland. Oregon should prioritize welcoming these refugees.
It is part of our culture to accept the poor and downtrodden; since 1975, more than 75,000 refugees have found home in Oregon. Kindness and generosity are morally-good, and we have the opportunity to be kinder and more generous by offering a new home to people fleeing war and brutality, as we have done so many times before. Embracing the arrival of new Oregonians carries other benefits as well. As John Tapogna outlined in a recent Oregon Way piece, Oregon needs more workers, business owners, and students in order to keep shops open, lights on, manufacturing lines humming. Afghan refugees will need rewarding work upon arrival and will seek out educational opportunities for those looking to upskill or resume their preliminary studies. Finally, the exchange of ideas and cultures when Afghans join other Oregonians can create new ways of doing business, of dressing, of communicating, of living.
Second, we can build a more vital and energetic Oregon by increasing regulations to limit environmental harm by businesses. For some folks, the idea of red tape makes them want to run for the hills. But, hear me out! I’ve observed on my farm and across Oregon that new regulations based on “you cannot do [insert activity]” drive innovation, creativity, and lower costs, especially when the regulation is focused on environmental issues.
Rather than fight regulations tailored to benefit current and future Oregonians, small business owners should see them as opportunities to develop better processes and products. My wife and I started a certified-organic vegetable farm in 2006. When we needed to move from surface to groundwater, our water right required us to limit the rate of pumping from our well. We discovered the easiest and least costly way was to install a variable-speed drive, which basically tells the pump exactly how fast to spin. Our solution to the regulatory limit yielded many side benefits from lower electricity bills over the past 15 years. We freed up funds and resources by being more efficient in our water use. With those funds and resources, we obtained a cannabis license in 2016. Again, we encountered regulations. The rules related to cannabis are extensive, and, absent creative thinking, they may be prohibitively so.
Consider the rule that cannabis be shielded from the public view and guarded against open access. I could have built the standard $100,000 chain link fence to comply, but my experience farming in wine country inspired me to build a $4000 fence out of vineyard posts, elk fencing, and plywood. In other words, the regulation was outcome oriented and, therefore, allowed me to apply my entrepreneurial thinking to how I’d comply. I know Oregonians around the state are capable of that sort of creativity. Small business owners should work to share these sorts of common sense solutions to meaningful regulations.
A statewide example is that, with climate change here now, we need to take action to limit carbon emissions by imposing graduated caps on allowable emissions. Businesses will respond to these carbon limits with creative solutions. Which means this is another case study in regulations that are open-ended and outcome-oriented driving innovation.
Third, the opposite can be true: when we stop defining the world of possibilities in our regulations (“you have to do Y”), we can increase the common good. What do I mean? A pressing issue is the high cost of homes. Our land use system used to promote the single-family, detached home by zoning and explicitly defining a legal residence. The result is that we could only fit so many homes into a city at high cost. In addition, our land use process and permitting system mean that most homes and developments are subject to protest and discretion, and require cash up front with an uncertain timeline.
If we expand the world of what is possible for a home (reducing the minimum lot and home sizes, and the expanding the definition of a legal residence), while easing the burdens on builders (fees at the time of occupancy, by-right permitting, and allowing owner-as-contractor), we can dramatically expand the types of homes while lowering the cost. Why does all that matter? In Oregon, we have soaring home prices, limited land, stagnant wages, and high rates of homelessness. By easing the regulatory burden around “what you have to do,” we can build the ranks of homeowners to build a stronger Oregon.
Welcoming refugees and rethinking the role of regulations will put Oregon on the path out of the disasters of the last 18 months and buffer us from future shocks to the system. When we’re being threatened on so many fronts, creative solutions must be on the table.
Casey Kulla: farmer, scientist, Yamhill County Commissioner, Democrat for Governor.
Photo credit: "Immigrants & Refugees Welcome Sign" by Only in Oregon is licensed under CC BY 2.0
"How Green Is This Valley" by swainboat is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0