Newport is now the first city on the Oregon coast to formally acknowledge the threat of climate change when it manages its estuary habitat, and the city plans to revise its estuary management policies more frequently to adapt to changing conditions.

On Monday, October 21,  the Newport City Council passed a resolution committing the City to revisiting its portion of the Yaquina Bay Estuary Management Plan (YBEMP/Plan) to keep pace with new science around climate change, sea level rise impacts, changes in natural resources, and anticipated development in the local area. 

This great outcome arrives after an October 7 vote by the Council to adopt the first comprehensive update of its Estuary Management Plan in over 40 years.

We are celebrating this victory, and thank all the planners and DLCD staff for their hard work updating the plan and the City of Newport for their leadership. Also see our recent interview with OPB: Think Out Loud, discussing this win.

 

More to be done.

Despite the good news, the City stopped short of adding amendments to the Plan to ensure that Yaquina Bay’s people and environment are ready for the future: both threats and opportunities. 

In the run-up to Newport’s YBEMP adoption, Oregon Shores joined several other organizations advocating for further planning and protections. Here are some of the important changes needed for a climate-ready estuary management plan:

  1. Newport’s newly-adopted portion of the YBEMP did not update any zoning standards to make real its commitment to consider the realities of climate change and other present and future impacts. Yaquina Bay and its people deserve strong standards for the Bay and that includes consequences for ill-conceived development decisions. Through new standards, the City could have worked to ensure the consideration of sea level rise in zoning decisions, prioritize nature-based solutions instead of traditional rip-rap for shoreline stabilization, and strengthen mitigation requirements to protect estuarine resources. These are missed opportunities that put local communities at risk.
  2. The YBEMP as adopted by Newport failed to incorporate new policies to protect declining eelgrass meadows, an estuarine habitat essential to Yaquina Bay – and its salmon, rockfish, Dungeness crab, shellfish, and migratory water birds.

 

Let’s keep the momentum going.

The next stop for the plan is the Toledo City Council and then the Lincoln County Commission in 2025. We’ll be in touch about future opportunities to help support a climate-ready Yaquina Bay.

In the meantime, if you want to get involved in building more resilient estuaries and communities, check out these upcoming opportunities to participate in Estuary Resilience Action Planning in Lincoln and Lane counties.

 

Thank you for your continued commitment to help protect Oregon’s vital estuaries! 

  • Climate
  • Estuaries