By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews
For the second time in a year, a Lincoln County circuit judge has ruled against a business owner’s housing project in a forest north of Yachats and ordered four yurts on the property be removed.
Judge Marcia Buckley on Monday denied another appeal attempt by Linda Hetzler and her husband, Thomas Smith, to keep the yurts to house workers on 20 acres of property they own off Starr Creek Road. Hetzler and Smith own the popular Drift Inn restaurant and motel and related businesses in Yachats.
Lincoln County had gone to court in 2023 to limit the property to one existing dwelling allowed under the county’s timber conservation zoning regulations and because of septic issues.
Their attorney, Russell Baldwin, argued unsuccessfully that Hetzler and Smith’s operation fell under Oregon’s forest practices act, that the county had no jurisdiction over the act, and that the yurts and a travel trailer were temporary structures allowed under the act.
Buckley on Monday, and Judge Sheryl Bachart last February rejected those arguments.
Hetzler said recently in court documents that the trailer has been moved off the property and the yurts closed as living quarters for six people and were now being used for storage.
Monday’s summary judgement said Baldwin and Hetzler’s were not entitled to the relief they sought and upheld rulings made by Bachart last year and a ruling Buckley made in October.
The ruling means that the yurts must now also be removed, according to the February decision.
Hearing in October
Buckley ruled in October that the county was correct in saying the dwellings were not needed to do forestry work on the property and that a septic system for the development violates health rules.
Hetzler and Baldwin made a series of filings that dispute the February decision by Bachart, who ruled that the development violated zoning ordinances. Hetzler represented herself earlier this year but retained Baldwin for the challenges and Bachart subsequently assigned the case to Buckley because of her previous conflicts with Baldwin.
Baldwin and assistant county counsel Douglas Holbrook filed pages of arguments over the summer. Baldwin argued that Hetzler was immune from county zoning and other rules under Oregon’s forest practices act, that the county lacked jurisdiction, and that temporary structures like the yurts and RV are allowed under state rules.
The county’s attorney argued zoning for the land – timber conservation — allows for just one structure and that Hetzler expanded the septic system to handle the development without county approval.
Buckley heard oral arguments in September, made her ruling in October and Baldwin asked for another hearing on his court filings and objections this week. In a three paragraph ruling Monday, granted the county’s request for a summary judgement against Hetzler and Smith, which means the yurts need to be removed.
It’s about time these scofflaws get their illegal development shut down and removed. This is a blatant and obnoxious violation of state land use laws and zoning.
Your comments appears to show a lack of knowledge of the housing crisis in our area.
Linda owns several businesses in Yachats with employees, and affordable housing in our area is nonexistent. Maybe you could share some of your innovative suggestions on how to solve the housing crisis in our area.
If you can’t run a business legally you don’t run a business. There’s no excuse for breaking the law and that’s exactly what they’ve been doing. They are effectively making taxpayers subsidized their business. The housing shortage is no excuse.
So it’s acknowledged that the yurts are used for housing then? There is a housing crisis everywhere. That doesn’t mean people can just ignore the law or only use our when it suits them.
Can understand how this might be frustrating for Hetzler and Smith. But I also understand that the laws and ordinances are in place to protect the people and environment. Maybe if they go about getting the permits and county condoned septic on the property, they can move forward with there plan to provide housing for their employees.
The reason they did this illegally was that they knew a permit for it would have been denied. Another example of people trying to evade the regulations.
It’s unfortunate to me that an employer trying to provide housing for their employees, an employer who brings in a lot of money to Yachats businesses, is shut down, when in my neighborhood, there are neighbors with several occupied trailers and other such housing on parcels zoned for only one dwelling, and no county oversight at all. Why one place, and not all?
Has anybody noticed that employers in this area have a hard time getting employees because of the high cost of living and lack of affordable housing on the coast? Linda with “her own land” was trying to create a place for employees to live. It is her land so she should be able to do with it what she likes. Get the government out of it.
That’s ridiculous. The government is there to protect people and the environment. How about we just build a chemical plant next to your house? Land use laws exist for a reason and people who break them have no legitimate excuse, housing shortage or not.
Well the government and environmentalists did a bang up job protecting southern California. So keep up your faith in the government. It is her land to do as she pleases, in my opinion. The chemical plant has to go somewhere doesn’t it?
Southern California sold out to developers in the late 1960s and 70s, which is why the housing there burned so fast and furious because all those crammed together houses are fuel in a fire. The government has always been pro development down there and only more recently was there more concern about preserving open spaces. But in southern California that is too little way too late. So people who don’t like land regulations should go live in a hell hole like southern California.
The law is the law. Oregon’s land use law, written, and carried in the Legislature by a farmer who was a legislator, has been in effect since 1978 (it was enacted in ’73, but given a 5 year grace period for public information/education).
The piece states that Ms Hetzler repped herself in the original proceedings, yet from her court filings and her public statements on the subject it appears that she’s not actually even conversant with the statute and/or applicable case law. But for those of us who are, we always knew that she would lose this dispute.
TC zone land only allows one dwelling. And septic systems are sized to the dwelling. A dwelling won’t get a cert of occupancy if its subsoil system isn’t adequate to the projected number of residents.
No rational person disputes the issue of the dearth of housing (it’s a national crisis), and while this was well-intentioned, it was a blatant violation that could not be overlooked by authorities.
States have the power to enact zoning and other land use laws. Oregon has done so, and Hetzler (nor anyone else) does not have the right to build, in the state, wherever she pleases. That obviously also applies to the owners of the chemical plant.
The legislature, representing the body politic (and a Republican governor who signed the bill into law) saw fit to safeguard Oregon’s agricultural lands from rampant development. Timberlands are part of those ag lands.
And by the way, multiple attempts have been made throughout the years to repeal SB100 (the enacting legislation). Also obviously, those have failed, both in the legislature, and at the ballot.