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CITY ATTORNEY — CIVIL DEPARTMENT f: Planning Commission -2- February 6, 1985 (1 In some ways there is no pure legislative land use decision- making in Oregon. Since 1976, LCDC Goal 2 has required that "all [land use] decisions" have an "adequate factual base." This requirement applies to legislative and quasi- judicial deci- sions. This requirement of a factual base requires factual findings in both legislative and quasi - judicial proceedings. And all land use decisions require the application of some pre- existing standards. Legislative plan adoptions and amendments, for example, require findings that the plan conforms to statewide . land use planning goals, i.e., the application of the goals as criteria to justify a plan adoption or amendment. In short, there is no unfettered discretion in land use decisionmaking as there is in pure legislative decisionmaking. Thus, the line, in the land use area, between these two types of decisionmaking is blurred or, in some cases, non - existent. Most land use legislative decisionmaking involves findings and the application of some criteria like the process of quasi - judicial decisionmaking. Some quasi - judicial decisions involve the creation of policy. For example, the Commission recently through its rulings on particular zone change requests created a policy ( - on commercial land in the West llth area. In order to examine what process to employ for these mixed decisionmaking exercises, we need to first focus on the policy reasons for procedural differences between the two. C. Procedural Distinctions - Extent and Rationale. The key procedural differences between quasi - judicial and legislative procedures are procedural protections given to parti- cipants in the process and the degree of justification required of the decisionmaker. Where a decision is quasi - judicial, and particularly affects a person or a small group of persons, procedural requirements are imposed to: 1. Help assure that the decision is correct as to the facts; and, 2. Assure that fair attention is given to indi- viduals particularly affected. On the other hand, no such factual accuracy or individual attention is required in the legislative process of creating policy. For example, in the development of your rules on appeals, a legislative proceeding, you did not need to find particular facts nor were you required to give a participant status to any individual or group. Compare this to a change of zone proceeding where it is necessary to make factual findings to justify the change and the property owner or applicant is a mandatory party TV -2