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Oregon bill would let state declare current riverbeds state-owned if landowners agree, DSL says
Summary
The Department of State Lands told a Senate committee that Senate Bill 74 A would add an optional pathway to declare waterways "navigable for title" by treating present riverbeds and banks as state-owned when adjacent landowners consent, while keeping the existing, more detailed mapping process as an alternative.
Vicki Walker, director of the Oregon Department of State Lands, told the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Land Use, Natural Resources, and Water on April 28 that the department supports Senate Bill 74 A and that the bill would add a second, optional method for declaring waterways "title navigable" and therefore state-owned.
"We are in support of Senate Bill 74 a," Walker said, adding the bill preserves existing options and was developed with stakeholder input. Walker said the department’s interest is “protecting the existing waterway for the public trust uses.”
The bill would let the state, with an adjacent property owner’s agreement, treat the current riverbed and bank to the ordinary high water line as state-owned. Chris Castelli, deputy director of the Land Management Division at DSL, told the committee that current law requires detailed, time-consuming mapping of river channel changes since statehood to determine ownership. That approach…
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