The Bend City Council voted Wednesday night to approve a settlement with homeowners in a neighborhood at Bend’s southwestern edge who claimed easement rights to the road separating their homes from a planned housing development, which includes more than 100 new single-family homes near the Deschutes National Forest.

The settlement is the result of a two-year-old dispute ensnaring both the city and the developer of 22-acres along Bachelor View Road. A development agreement accompanies the settlement, with changes to plans including fewer homes, rural street design without curbs and sidewalks, a road gate and the construction of a berm blocking the view of existing homes from new ones.

Larry Kine, the developer for property owner Bachelor View LLC, said he agreed to the new plans in October, leaving the city to settle the road issue with homeowners.

The city agrees to pay plaintiffs $100,000 in legal fees, move forward with the development application and put up “no parking” signs in exchange for dropping the lawsuit.

“I believe this is a fair and reasonable settlement that will allow the development of needed housing along Bachelor View Road to continue without the expense of further litigation,” Bend Mayor Melanie Kebler said Wednesday evening before the city council approved the settlement.

The use of rural road standards and the revised configuration limits how much of the road is needed for the city, “eliminating the opposition to the proposed housing and any possible future condemnation of the real property partition,” according to the October development agreement.

 

Kine said the legal challenges have had no impact on timelines for home building on the property. He said he was happy to work toward a resolution.

“I think it’s actually a better layout for everybody involved,” he said of the plan changes.

The first phase of homebuilding — now a clearing of dirt visible across a bike path from Century Drive — will sit idle for another few months before infrastructure work begins, Kine said. The next phases, which stretch farther from the road, will be built out over the next six or seven years.

Kine predicts the single-family homes will sell for anywhere between $875,000 and $1.1 million.

Plaintiffs of the suit declined to comment when reached on Thursday. Cort Buchholz, a plaintiff, could not confirm if plaintiffs had signed the agreements, and whether the city’s Wednesday decision meant the end of the dispute.

Buchholz told The Bulletin in 2024 that “taking of the easements benefits the developer and the small number of people buying the homes.” In 2021 and 2022, Buchholz and others met with Kine to discuss buying some of the property for a park, but talks broke down. When residents lobbied the Bend Park & Recreation District for a park in the area, the district declined, stating higher-density areas were a priority.

Then, in one of Bend’s most heavily wooded neighborhoods, developers clearcut 10 acres of ponderosa pines to make way for homes, adding fuel to the fire for the city’s new tree preservation code, which Kine has refused to follow for other affordable housing developments and other developers have opposed.

In 2024, Tim Phillips, another plaintiff, lamented the “painful” loss of trees, and of rural character. Kine said part of his agreement with neighbors is to leave streets without sidewalks and curbs, maintaining that character.

“It’s going to feel more like a county road, which gives it a little bit different taste for being right next to the forest,” Kine said.