Beaverton Planning Commission Work Session – August 19, 2026
Beaverton Planning Commission Work Session – August 19, 2026
The Beaverton Planning Commission met on August 19, 2026, for a work session that included a presentation on the updated Beaverton Climate Action Plan, a training on the city's Trees and Natural Area Regulations, and the adoption of a land use order for the Williams Court Tree Plan 2 appeal. Chair Adams presided, with Commissioners Mettler, McCann, McAvoy, Speck, and Winter present; Commissioner Holmes was absent and excused.
Discussion Items
Presentation on the Beaverton Climate Action Plan (BCAP) – Kevin Boylan of the city's sustainability program presented the 2035 update. The plan is structured around measurable objectives and co‑benefits, includes a new chapter on organizational capacity, and quantifies the cost of inaction. Nearly half of Beaverton’s emissions come from building energy and another half from transportation. A new series of eight story maps (the “BCAP Navigator”) helps users explore emissions sources, climate impacts (heat, wildfire smoke, drought), and focus areas such as natural infrastructure. Commissioners asked about integrating the plan into city decision‑making and about real‑time modeling; staff noted that static modeling was used during development and that a dashboard is being created for annual reporting to the City Council.
Training on Trees and Natural Area Regulations – Planning Division Manager Anna Slatinsky provided an overview of the regulatory landscape: federal (Endangered Species Act, Clean Water Act), state (Goal 5 natural resources, Goal 10 housing, Oregon revenue constraints), regional (Metro Title 13, Clean Water Services), and local (Beaverton Development Code, Cooper Mountain Community Plan, Significant Natural Resource Areas). She highlighted weaknesses in the current tree code, including limited limits on removal of significant trees and lack of a mechanism to add trees to the inventory. Commissioners discussed potential small‑scale improvements (e.g., size‑based mitigation, voluntary tree designation) and the resource constraints (staffing, funding for consultants) that have delayed a comprehensive update. Slatinsky noted that the city’s code is more permissive than many other Oregon cities and that a political context more favorable to protection may now exist, but capacity remains the primary barrier.
Key Outcomes
- The Commission voted unanimously (5–0) to approve Order No. 3055, adopting the final land use order for APP 2026-00583, Williams Court Tree Plan 2 appeal, confirming that the order reflects the Commission’s earlier decision. The meeting adjourned at 7:36 PM.
Meeting Transcript
Now is the time and place for a meeting of the Beaverton Planning Commission. For the record, I will do a roll call to verify which commission members are participating this evening. Commissioner Mettler. Present. Commissioner McCann. Present. Commissioner McElvoy. Present. Commissioner Speck. Present. Commissioner Winter. Present. And I'm Chair Adams, I'm present. Let the record show that Commissioner Holmes is absent and excused from the meeting tonight. We are now at Commission Communications. Commission, any communications. Looks like no communications. We are now at staff communications. Staff, any communications. Good evening, Chair. I'm Honest Latinsky, Planning Division Manager here in Beaverton. I just have one announcement, which is quite bittersweet. But Max Everett, who has been our stalwart planning commission support person as well as support person for a lot of other things that the planning team does is moving and today is their last day. So I just wanted to take the opportunity to say thank you, Max, for all of your support with Planning Commission. And I would just highlight the successful migration from uh across a new technology platform, moving from Granicus to iCompass, but more visibly the transition from our remote planning commission meetings that had been in place since 2020 through our new hybrid setup that allows community members to attend in person and for us to have these in real life face-to-face conversations which has a lot of wonderful benefits, and Max really helped make that a smooth transition. So thank you to Max. We'll miss you. And uh yeah, let's make it a good one. That's all thank you. I would like to thank Max as well for setting up our meetings and making them flawless. So thank you. And you will be missed. The first item on the agenda is a presentation on the Beaverton Climate Action Plan. The order of the work session tonight will be as follows. We'll begin with the city staff presentation, followed by discussion and questions of staff by the commission. We will now begin with the staff presentation presented by project manager Kevin Boylan. Good evening, everyone. Thank you for having me. I'm Kevin Boylan. I work in the city's sustainability program. And tonight we're going to talk a little bit about the recent update to the city's climate action plan and then share with you some new resources that we've put together, including maps that can be used. Resources can help in this committee and the work that you do. Policy making aspects. And then extensive community engagement that looks at what uh folks value and what they're concerned about. And so all of that, you know, forms the foundation of what's in the plan that takes a largely kind of narrative view. It's it's a lot of text in this PDF document. Um, but it has a new structure that uh is organized in a hierarchy that leads to measurable objectives, which was missing from the first. Each of the strategies and objectives in the plan contains background information and rationale as to why they're included. So here at the city or staff changes, there's paper trail, right? There's a reference document of why this made it into this.
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