You’ve probably already seen news reports on a court ruling upholding the Oregon Water Resource Department’s denial of a water right for the planned Thornburgh Resort. Here’s one from The Bulletin, one from the Source Weekly, and here’s a press release from WaterWatch. It would seem that lack of water would doom this development, but these guys have a ton of financial backing, have had serious setbacks in the past, and keep rising from the dead. Perhaps this is a final stake in the heart, but who knows?

Soapbox: I have been tracking this development for about 15 years. (And have an entire section on Thornburg in this blog.) Many groups have participated in fighting Thornburgh over the years at different times. Some have participated, gone silent and reemerged, some got involved late in the fight. The real local hero in this fight is Nunzie Gould who has been at it for over 20 years. (See this OPB story.) This tenacious woman has been involved from day one, shining a spotlight on the issue, and paying for numerous legal challenges. If it were not for Nunzie this monstrosity of a water sucking resort would have been built long ago. Thank you Nunzie!

Oregon Public Broadcasting, which continues to do a better job covering Thornburgh Resort developments than local outlets, reported yesterday that a new well permit has been denied.  This is not a major setback for Thornburgh, at least not yet, and they can appeal it, but it certainly marks a welcome and overdue change on the part of the Oregon Water Resources Department who until recently seemed to approve every well permit they saw.  Now, if only our county commissioners would stop approving everything that Thornburgh requests, this monstrosity might get scaled back.  I’m not holding my breath.

The latest in a series of Deschutes County commission meetings that have occurred over many years occurred last Wednesday, March 29.  The current issue is appeals to a county hearings officer’s determination to deny Thornburgh’s request to modify their Final Fish & Wildlife Master Plan.  The FWMP must be modified to accommodate changes that have been made to Thornburgh’s development plans.  Thornburgh argues that the changes are minor while others argue that the changes are significant, and the entire plan must be resubmitted.  The hearings officer denied Thornburgh’s request to make changes to the FWMP.  If upheld, Thornburgh would be in violation of their approved development plan.

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It’s been a while since I wrote about Thornburgh Resort since it seems to be in an endless loop. Today was the latest Deschutes County Commission meeting where no decision was made after 3 hours of testimony. The specific topic of this meeting is really secondary to the ongoing theme. Lawyers and experts for the developer are in a never ending argument with lawyers and experts for Nunzie Gould, the woman who has been suing to stop Thornburgh for 15 years. Add in the Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife who says that Thornburgh has not proved they are meeting their obligation for no net loss of water. The new development today was the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs now wants to get involved. I’m sure that other groups, most notably Central Oregon LandWatch, will soon put out a great description of the specific issues now being debated, but the bottom line is there is no end in sight. Regardless of what the County Commissioners decide in a month it will be appealed and the drama will go on. The good news is that there seems to be near universal public opposition to Thornburgh which has not always been the case. If you are a masochist you can watch a recording of the hearing here.

I’m sure that we will be hearing a lot more about this soon, but last Friday (July 29) Thornburgh notified the Department of State Lands that they were terminating their application to purchase land to add to the resort currently under construction. I doubt that this will make any real difference to the development and water use of the resort but it is good to see that public pressure is starting to make some impact on this water sucking monster that won’t go away. I wish our county commissioners would grow backbones and stop the continued approval of development permits for this massive water project that is already causing local wells to go dry. Kudos to Nunzie Gould and Central Oregon LandWatch for their continued leadership in the campaign against Thornburgh.

In an extremely surprising but welcome move, last January ODFW sent this letter to Deschutes County regarding Thornburgh. Yesterday, I was pleasantly shocked to learn that after many requests over many years, ODFW has weighed in on the topic of Thornburgh’s use of water. Read the letter yourself, but the bottom line is that they do not believe that Thornhurgh has proven they have adequate cold water to properly mitigate the damage their pumping will do to the Middle Deschutes. Of course, this has been a primary objection many of us have made for some time. Now the question is, what will Deschutes County do with this information? The law says that Thornburgh cannot pump water without ODFW approving the mitigation but the County has not let that get in the way in the past.

Thornburgh Resort, the water monster that just won’t go away, is up for its next Deschutes County hearing. Comments are due by 6 pm on January 4. Central Oregon LandWatch has an excellent discussion of the topic as well as information on how to comment on their website. Water is at the heart of the matter. Below are the comments I have submitted.

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It’s almost been a year since my last post on the monster that won’t die: Thornburgh Resort. Things have been progressing behind the scenes in the legal system, however, and it has resurfaced in a way that we citizens can again have input. Central Oregon Land Watch has done an excellent job covering the latest developments. I encourage you to read their post, and some of my old ones as well (use the link on the right), and perhaps submit comments (see the COLW site for how to do that). I was on the Zoom call for the hearing last week and the Hearings Officer was very narrowly focused on a specific issue, but an outpouring of public comment can’t hurt. For what it’s worth, below are my comments submitted last Wednesday in response to the hearing the prior evening.

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Yesterday our county commissioners gave approval for some construction to begin at Thornburgh Resort. I would anticipate continued legal challenges and there will be more approvals required as development continues, but it is clear that our county government is supportive of adding another massive golf community, including lakes for water skiing, to Central Oregon. I understand that we are going to continue to grow but without a significant change in the way that growth is managed we are going to run out of water. It has already happened in other west coast communities and we are not immune.

Yesterday the Deschutes County Commission voted to continue moving forward with the approval of the proposed Thornburgh Resort near Eagle Crest. A final decision on the first golf course is still a couple of weeks away, but their comments seemed to indicate that final approval will be granted. I continue to be concerned with the amount of water that Thornburgh will use, its impact on our aquifer, and the corresponding reduction in surface water (our rivers and streams). Three golf courses, artificial lakes, lodging, and housing will use a lot of water. Below is the email I sent to our commissioners earlier today.

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Recently, I have spent far too many hours researching the proposed Thornburgh Resort.  This project is a great example of how confusing and illogical planning laws and regulations can be.  For example, did you know that when you pump water out of an aquifer that you only “mitigate” for a portion of it?  Or that the mitigation water may or may not actually be measured?  I could go on.  Arguing and litigating about these issues is why it can take over a decade to reach decisions.  (For an example of just how convoluted it is, see this legal summary of the various court cases that have been brought against the project.) Rather than wade into that thicket, I decided to take a different approach in my comments to Deschutes County Commissioners on the Thornburgh project.  Here is the email that I sent today.

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Yesterday I was interviewed for a story on the proposed Thornburgh Resort, an experience I always find frustrating. We spent 20 minutes discussing local water issues relating to the resort and the reporter picked something that I guess was a good sound bite, but a minor element of what I was trying to convey to her: the fact that we are dramatically overusing water. In any event, raising the profile of this issue is a good thing and I am thankful it is being covered.

Note: I state in the interview that 9+ CFS of water was for the first phase of development only.  In fact, 9.28 CFS is for the entire development.  I sincerely regret the error, although it does not change my position on the matter.

Since 2005 there has been an effort to develop a new destination golf resort just southwest of Eagle Crest Resort near Redmond.  The proposed Thornburgh Resort will include multiple golf courses, lakes, temporary lodging, and detached housing.  It is controversial, with multiple appeals and lawsuits, including one that will soon be heard by the Oregon Supreme Court.  The developer continues to push forward, however, and last Wednesday, June 17^th, was the initial public hearing by the Deschutes County Board of Commissioners on the Site Plan Review for Phase A golf course development.  You can watch video of the hearing here, it starts at about 3:34:00 and continues for approximately 3 hours.  I watched it live and was fascinated with the tension between growth and development with land use laws, water availability, affordable housing, etc.

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