There’s plenty of room for everyone to have their theories about the city of Bend’s housing incentives.

Members of the public complained about the city’s $10 million tax incentive to the Jackstraw apartment development. Was the city getting enough in return? Shouldn’t the rent be affordable?

The Bend City Council responded, in part, by putting a pause on some incentives.

And then the Bend Park & Recreation District Chair Nathan Hovekamp joined in later saying that the city’s “mechanism is frankly, honestly, a kind of gift to developers.”

Our theory is: Such tension is inevitable.

Many people may agree that housing prices are high and availability is too limited. But agreeing on just how to fix it is tricky.

For more than a minute, it looked like the tension on this issue between the city of Bend and the park district was going to take us back to the not-so-long-ago days when councilors and park board members regularly traded barbs. At the district’s meeting last week, though, the comments were circumspect. The district board did pass a new policy for evaluating tax incentives and fee waivers. Gone was any incisive rhetoric from Hovekamp. The policy was also tuned down slightly. We lined up an early version and the version the district passed to see what was changed.

When we first came across the policy in February, Mayor Melanie Kebler had told us she was “a bit alarmed.” For instance, she singled out language in the proposed policy that the district would consider if a park board decision would set an “unfavorable precedent.” Unfavorable for whom? Kebler asked us rhetorically.

The word unfavorable was cut from the policy passed.

Another bit of editing was to delete the word “negative” from this passage: “Whether foregoing the revenue that would otherwise be derived from the fee or tax assessment will have a negative effect on the District’s overall financial health and its ability to provide services to the community it serves.”

Those are not major revisions and that goes back to our theory. The tension is inevitable when it comes to housing incentives. The public was right to raise concerns about the city’s housing incentives. The park district board is right to have concerns

But unless you believe that all is well in housing, surely some form of incentives do have a place.