The Tannler Drive proposal and Oregon's new housing laws, explained for West Linn homeowners

If you own a home in West Linn, you have probably heard something about the Tannler Drive project by now, and possibly something about not being allowed to testify on it. Both are real, and the second one surprises people more than the first.

Here is the factual version, without a side.

Update, October 12: denied, then appealed

Since this post first ran, the project has moved:

• On August 26, the Planning Commission voted 5 to 0 to deny the application. Local reporting described the commission’s concerns as stormwater and grading, retaining walls, access roads, and the standards of the site’s Office Business Center zone. The city’s final decision is dated September 2.
• The denial has been appealed (city file AP-26-02).
• The applicant also filed a complaint with the state’s Housing Accountability and Production Office, which triggered a state review.
• On September 22, the City Council voted to hand the appeal to an independent hearings officer instead of deciding it themselves. In a Tidings opinion piece, Mayor Rory Bialostosky pointed to the legal complexity of the new state housing laws, the pending state review, and how much contact councilors had had with the public.

As of today, no hearing date or ruling has been announced. The city’s project page is the place to watch.

What is actually proposed

Tannler Drive. A 320-unit apartment development at Tannler Drive and Blankenship Road, on the hillside above I-205 overlooking the Willamette. The plan is ten buildings of one to three bedroom apartments, four of them with ground floor commercial space, plus a clubhouse. The applicant is Tannler Holdings LLC.

The Planning Commission held its public hearing on Monday, August 10, 2026, and did not decide. Commissioners continued deliberations to Wednesday, August 26. As Commissioner Kris Kachirisky put it at the hearing, “Given the scope of this project, I think cutting deliberations short is not prudent.”

Oppenlander. Separately, Venture Properties is in the pre-application stage on the roughly ten acre former Oppenlander youth sports field on Rosemont Road, with 45 homes proposed: 38 duplexes and 7 single-family. That one is earlier in the process.

The part that catches people off guard

At the August 10 hearing, public testimony was limited to the commercial parts of the project. Not the housing.

That is not a West Linn decision. Two state laws, House Bill 4037 and Senate Bill 974, took effect July 1, 2026. Together they bar local governments from holding public hearings on housing developments that meet the city’s clear and objective standards. The intent is to speed up housing approvals statewide by removing discretionary review. The practical effect in West Linn was that the city’s special counsel had to tell the room, in so many words, that the testimony that night could only address the commercial assets.

Residents have raised parking, traffic, and the realignment of Tannler Drive. The applicant’s attorney’s position is straightforward: the city must follow state law.

Whatever you think of the outcome, the process change is the thing to understand. For projects that pencil out under the objective standards, the public hearing is no longer the lever it used to be. That is now true in every Oregon city, not just this one.

What it means if you own here

I am not going to tell you a development is good or bad for your value, because that depends on your street, and anyone who gives you a confident number on that is guessing.

What I can tell you is what to actually watch.

Supply is the real story. West Linn’s housing needs analysis calls for 1,005 new homes over 20 years, with about a third of them affordable to households earning up to 80 percent of area median income. The town has been well short of building at that pace. Projects of this size are how a city closes that gap, and more supply generally moderates price growth rather than collapsing it.

Proximity matters more than headlines. If you are within a few blocks of Tannler Drive or Rosemont Road, construction traffic and road realignment would be real considerations if either project goes forward. If you are across town, the effect on your specific home is mostly indirect.

Timing matters if you are selling soon. A buyer’s agent doing their homework will know about an approved project near your listing. That is not a problem, it is a conversation. Getting ahead of it with accurate information is far better than having it surface during inspection.

The calendar is public. The city posts housing project materials and hearing schedules on its planning pages, and that is the primary source. Read it before you read the comment threads.

The honest summary

West Linn is being asked to add housing, the state has changed how much say a city has in approving it, and two visible projects happen to be landing at the same moment. That is a genuine shift in how land use works here, and it is worth paying attention to.

It is not, by itself, a reason to buy or sell. If you want to know what any of this means for your particular address, I am glad to look at your street specifically and give you a straight answer, including when the answer is “not much.” Reach out any time.