A growing coalition of property owners, builders, realtors, farmers, and housing advocates standing together against the systematic abuse of Oregon's land use appeal process.
Oregon's land use appeal process was designed to protect communities. Instead, a single organization — Central Oregon LandWatch — has turned it into a tool to systematically block property owners from exercising their legal rights, even after local government approval.
Sources: Deschutes County Community Development, The Bend Bulletin, OPB, LUBA Records
Property rights unite people across the political spectrum. Our coalition brings together organizations and individuals who believe in responsible development, housing access, and the rule of law.
Central Oregon LandWatch wants you to believe they're fighting greedy developers. The reality is the opposite.
LandWatch is a well-funded special-interest group backed by out-of-region donors and activist attorneys, operating with a litigation budget that dwarfs anything a rural Oregon family could ever match. They partner with Portland-based organizations like 1000 Friends of Oregon to wage legal warfare against individual property owners — people who have no lobbyists, no legal defense fund, and no voice in Salem.
Large developers like 710 Properties can absorb a $150,000 LUBA appeal and wait five years. They have corporate attorneys on retainer and investors who understand the timeline. The system LandWatch exploits is an inconvenience for them — a line item in a pro forma.
But for the people LandWatch actually grinds down? It's devastating.
Harold Marken spent 40 years trying to make 60 acres work as a hay and cattle operation. Forty years of unprofitable farming on marginal soil. When he finally sought to rezone — after the county hearings officer agreed, after the Board of Commissioners approved it — LandWatch appealed. A retired rancher doesn't have a legal war chest. He has the equity in his land, which LandWatch is trying to make sure he can never unlock.
Lee and Joyce Garcia owned 9 acres in Powell Butte since 1995. No irrigation. No agricultural history. They just wanted to build a home on their own property. LandWatch fought them through LUBA and the Court of Appeals. A family asking to put a house on land they've owned for over two decades — and a moneyed special-interest group with salaried attorneys tried to stop them.
A honey farmer near Sisters got county approval to open a small meadery on his 84-acre ranch — a regenerative agriculture operation that would support pollinators, improve soil health, and create a sustainable farm business. LandWatch appealed, claiming there's "no legal basis" for a meadery in the EFU zone. The owner said it's simply a misunderstanding of what mead is. But he still has to pay an attorney to explain that to a hearings officer.
A couple who hosted weddings on their own 216-acre property — land that wasn't being farmed beyond two acres of poultry — had their county-approved permit reversed after LandWatch argued a wedding venue isn't a "private park." They weren't subdividing anything. They weren't building houses. They were hosting events on their own land, and LandWatch shut it down.
A guest ranch owner outside Sisters bought a property in 2021 with an existing county-approved guest ranch permit. LandWatch argued the permit had been abandoned for 15 years and should be void. Neighbors testified there was never even a ranch on the property to begin with — but instead of letting the new owner sort that out with the county, LandWatch dragged it through LUBA. Another small business owner buried in legal fees before serving a single guest.
Is your story next? If your approved land use permit was appealed by LandWatch, we want to hear from you. Every case we document strengthens the evidence of systematic abuse — and builds the foundation for legislative reform.
These aren't corporations. These are Oregon families — many of them multi-generational landowners — who are being told by a radical special-interest group that they don't have the right to decide what happens on land they've owned, worked, and paid taxes on for decades. LandWatch's leaders don't farm this land. They don't ranch it. They don't live on it. They sit in offices and file appeals against the people who do.
And here's the cruel math: LandWatch's attorneys are salaried and their appeals are bankrolled by donor money. Filing costs them almost nothing. But defending against one costs the property owner $30,000 to $100,000 — money most rural Oregon families simply don't have. Many give up before the case is even heard. That's not a side effect of LandWatch's strategy. That is the strategy. Bleed them dry. Wait them out. Call it "protecting farmland."
The irony is that Oregon's land use system was built to protect family farms. LandWatch has turned it into a weapon against them. When more than 63% of Oregon's 37,000 farms earn less than $10,000 a year, telling a family they can't rezone 20 acres of Class 7 rock and juniper isn't protecting agriculture — it's trapping people in poverty on land the state mislabeled as "farmland" fifty years ago.
"Selling land is any farmer's retirement plan. You don't have cash in the bank. You've got all your value in land."
— Deschutes County Farm Bureau Chair & President, Oregon Family Farm Association
LandWatch wants to make sure you can never access it. The big developers will survive LandWatch. The question is whether Oregon's farm families will.
Whether you're a property owner, a housing advocate, a builder, or a concerned citizen — here's how you can help end the abuse.