HomeMy WebLinkAboutCommittee of the Whole September 11 20071 WHATCOM COUNTY COUNCIL
2 Committee Of The Whole
3
4 September 11, 2007
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6 Council Chair Carl Weimer called the meeting to order at 6:00 p.m. in the Council
7 Committee Room, 311 Grand Avenue, Bellingham, Washington.
8
9 Present: Absent:
10 Barbara Brenner None
11 Dan McShane
12 Sam Crawford
13 Seth Fleetwood
14 Laurie Caskey - Schreiber
15 L. Ward Nelson
16
17 Caskey - Schreiber moved to go into executive session to discuss the first two
18 agenda items.
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20 Motion carried unanimously.
21
22 1. DISCUSSION AND UPDATE FOR COUNTY COUNCIL ON OPEN ISSUES
23 CONCERNING COLLECTIVE BARGAINING (AB2007 -207)
24
25 2. CONSIDERATION OF AN APPEAL OF THE HEARING EXAMINER'S DECISION
26 ON SHR06 -0021 AND SHC06 -0009, FILED BY SIMI JAIN, ATTORNEY FOR
27 LEN AND PAT HELTON, REGARDING REPAIRING PORTION OF DRAYTON
28 HARBOR ROAD (AB2007 -279)
29
30 3. PROJECT UPDATE FROM THE COUNCIL'S PLANNING AND POLICY ANALYST
31 (AB2007 -228)
32
33 Rebecca Craven, Council Planning and Policy Analyst, stated she would give an
34 update on the status of the urban growth area (UGA) discussions with the City of
35 Bellingham. The City Planning Department is briefing the City Council on September 24.
36 They are putting together a staff level team to talk to County staff.
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38 Crawford asked if the staff is going to give the City Council an overview of what the
39 County's done, and then make recommendations. Craven stated she doesn't know if the
40 City will make a recommendation. This is the first time the City Council has considered this
41 in any serious way since it made a recommendation to the County one and a half years ago.
42 Given the changes since then, there are many uncertainties about where the City Council is
43 at this point.
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45 She will also talk to the County Council and Planning Director Linda Petersen about
46 which County staff shall participate.
47
48 Dewey Desler, Deputy Administrator, stated that if this is going to be a Council -to-
49 Council discussion, he wants (inaudible).
50
51 Nelson stated he thought the intent of the meeting was for the City to receive the
52 information. Perhaps if there are questions, the staff could be there.
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Committee of the Whole, 9/11/2007, Page i
Fleetwood stated it's never been his expectation that they would simply have one
Council -to- Council meeting. The notion was to send some liaisons to meet with some staff
and councilmembers as need be to work out details. Then, when they've formulated a
position, they would schedule a formal Council -to- Council meeting, per the interlocal
agreement. That's a way down the road.
McShane stated the County Planning and Development Committee resolution
(inaudible) so it would be open, and all councilmembers could come. It is an opportunity to
correct any mistakes that were made through the process. The County Council may change
its views. The County will see what kind of information it gets from the City, the City's
opinion, and haw it affects the planning the City has done. He's really interested in their
infrastructure issues. The County needs to get good infrastructure information from the
City.
Desler stated they need a clearer picture of the process. He asked if there is
agreement on the process with the City. He asked the point when they actually make a
decision on process.
Fleetwood stated they haven't done that. They need to do that. Hopefully they can
have the discussion on a particular process on September 25, when they'll have an update
on what happened with the City.
Brenner stated she believed that the committees would work back - and -forth with
each other. She assumes the City Council will also go through the process to decide what
they want to do it, and haw and when they want to do it. Then they would start meeting.
She doesn't want to be an observer at their meeting. It should be a joint meeting. Craven
stated she will have some of those process discussions with the City Planning Director next
week to find out exactly what he's thinking in terms of staff -level discussions and whether
it's possible to narrow the options for how the process will work. The City Planning Director
can make some recommendations on process when he does his initial briefing to the City
Council. She hopes to get that information narrowed down in the next couple of weeks.
Weimer stated this will be the first time in a year and a half that the City Council will
have discussed this topic. The Council may take a while before it's ready to respond.
Craven stated that with the February deadline, they can't delay. They need to at
least start on the process.
McShane asked if the February deadline is to agree on the UGA's or includes the
interlocal agreements within the UGA's.
Karen Frakes, Prosecutor's Office, stated (inaudible).
Craven stated the existing interlocal agreement expires in November. They probably
need to do something with respect to that agreement, even if it's a short -term extension of
the existing language. They must talk to the City about how to deal with that and whether
they want to take on amendments to the interlocal agreement at the same time as the UGA
boundary discussion.
McShane stated some early discussions about where the County may want to go with
the interlocal agreement would help inform a final UGA decision. It addresses issues that
have been raised during County discussions that are legitimate concerns. They are
concerns the City has had as well. Craven stated that ultimately, the UGA boundaries and
Committee of the Whole, 9/11/2007, Page 2
1 the interlocal agreement will be tied together. The question is whether they want to let the
2 current agreement lapse in the interim until an agreement is reached on the boundaries or
3 do a short-term extension.
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5 She has been sending update memos regarding the water resources integration
6 project following each of the two workshops. Three more workshops are scheduled in the
7 next four weeks. A tremendous amount of work will happen between now and the middle of
8 October. They will go through existing plans, extract all the projects from those plans,
9 identify the criteria the group wants to use, and run the projects through the criteria to see
10 how they come out. She doesn't have to do any of the project work, but will go to the
11 meetings and keep track of that work.
12
13 The upcoming meeting is this Thursday. There is going to be a broad discussion
14 among the staff about what they want things to look like if the County handles water
15 resources in the best of all possible worlds, in terms of which projects that would get done,
16 how services would be delivered, how decisions would be made about future projects get
17 done, and what the internal structure within the County would look like. The staff is looking
18 forward to that discussion. She will brief the Council following that meeting.
19
20 She has not been giving the councilmembers any of the agendas, summaries, or
21 handouts from the workshops. The councilmembers will get a full notebook of the project
22 that the Public Works Department and Planning Department staff are preparing. In
23 addition, she is sending the councilmembers a one -page summary of each workshop. The
24 notebook will include all the agendas, handouts, and information on the work from each of
25 the workshops, including a follow -up summary.
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27 Nelson stated the summaries are nice to track what's going on. They are concise on
28 the issues that will involve the Council. If councilmembers have concerns, this is the time
29 to bring them up, before they spend money, time, and effort with staff on this. The staff is
30 understanding this and are excited about it. For instance, the staff was amazed by the
31 number of things being done by other people in the county that they didn't know about.
32 The coordination of this process is what they all want to see, so they can make good
33 decisions.
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35 Craven stated she's also been working on Lake Whatcom. She was tasked to come
36 up with options for a new urban zone designation for the UGA areas within the watershed.
37 That has lead to a variety of places. She took the direction broadly. There are many
38 possibilities for doing watershed protection in a lake context with the tools of a local
39 government. She narrowed those possibilities down to what can be done with a new urban
40 zone designation that is not currently being done by other regulations or existing County
41 codes. That led her to get information from the City on what services are available. The
42 City's current service zone extension policy provides that services extended into the UGA in
43 the watershed are conditioned on covenants to not allow any further subdivision of property
44 from the folks getting the services. She asked the City about those covenants and the
45 existence of water and service in the Hillsdale area, which is provided by Water District 7
46 through a contract with the City. That information wasn't easy to get. She found one
47 covenant to not allow further subdivision. There is not much existing protection against
48 further lot development.
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50 Brenner asked if they want people to dig wells and install septic systems in the UGA
51 in the Hillsdale and Geneva areas of the watershed. She is concerned that owners will get
52 water that way if they aren't allowed the service extensions. She doesn't know if that's
Committee of the Whole, 9/11/2007, Page 3
what the County wants. Those areas should be hooked up to services if there isn't good soil
and good drainage.
McShane stated that in the UGA at Lake Whatcom, one can install a well and septic
field of a lot is not less than five acres. Below five acres, there must be sewer.
Craven stated she is waiting for a map from the City Public Works Department on tax
lot numbers and legal descriptions, which corresponds with the information she went
through. She wants to tie the agreement numbers to a map so she can figure out where
those lots are located.
Weimer stated he thought that Ms. Craven found only one of those covenant
agreements.
Crawford stated the City adopted a policy to not extend water and sewer and to
negate all their City utility service extension zones. Then the City decided to allow services
for one year to those who had wl[I -serve letters. They expired in ]uly. In the meantime,
the City policy was to hook up people in the watershed to services if those people agreed to
not subdivide. That was done recently. That supercedes any policy from 2001. The City
will hook people up to services if they agree to not subdivide further. That's only been in
effect since very recently. There wasn't much incentive until that went into effect. Also,
remember that they should not overestimate the amount of subdivision that has occurred.
There has not been a lot. Craven stated there is not a lot of ground in Hillsdale to be
subdivided.
Nelson asked the effect the zoning will have on the area. Craven stated she's not
sure a great deal more that can be done simply with zoning than is currently being done,
unless they do a significant downzone with transfers of development rights (TDR's). That
raises the question of the status of the TDR program, where those rights would go, and
creating a market for them to be desirable.
Crawford stated the Council's Planning Committee spent a considerable amount of
time discussing the potential that is left. Hillsdale has the least potential for further
downzones. However, Geneva still has several hundred lots that could have at least one
subdivision. Craven stated that is information she's trying to get from the County Planning
Department. The geographic information system (GIS) analysis of sub - dividable lots is not
easy to do. It goes to the question of adjoining ownerships and consolidations. They must
either decide the information at one level above that is good enough for a policy decision or
spend a lot of staff time figuring out ownership and consolidation issues to get a really good
number. She's in the process of talking with County GIS staff about the kind of time they
are talking about.
Brenner asked if the County has any kind of agreement with the City in the Lake
Whatcom watershed about providing services for a charge if there is a health or safety issue
for existing development. The State of Washington Growth Management Act (GMA) says
they can do that. She's sensing that the Cities no longer allow that.
Nelson stated it has to do with public health.
Brenner stated the interlocal agreement should include a provision that the City will
extend services to an existing development in the Lake Whatcom watershed for health and
safety reasons, if people are willing to pay for it.
Committee of the Whole, 9/11/2007, Page 4
1 Caskey- Schreiber stated that is the attitude of the Lake Whatcom Sewer District,
2 which is why its done some of the things its done.
3
4 Brenner stated make sure that kind of thing is in place in case they need it.
5
6 McShane stated it's okay to have that kind of policy. It may be that it would be
7 important to define the location. There may be areas that require significant extensions,
8 and then there would be fear that it becomes available for hookup to lots that aren't
9 developed.
10
11 Nelson stated he would much rather talk about these as separate issues, based on
12 the merits of each issue, not on a policy that can be broadly interpreted.
13
14 Crawford stated it might be useful to have a GIS map of the northwestern portion of
15 Lake Whatcom with an overlay of who provides water in specific areas and an overlay of the
16 UGA boundaries. He asked if the City of Bellingham has an agreement with Water District
17 10. He asked if the City provides Water District 10 with water.
18
19 Nelson stated the City doesn't provide the water.
20
21 Crawford stated Water District 10 doesn't have an agreement that says it won't
22 provide water to lots that can be subdivided further. Water District 7 gets all of its water
23 from the City of Bellingham. There is no other source. The City has said that no lots
24 divided after 1991 shall have water. That's the disagreement. Regarding Geneva, there is
25 a very different scenario, It would be helpful to have a map.
26
27 Craven stated she attends the Interjurisdictional Coordinating Team, the Lake
28 Whatcom Management Program staff group to let them know she's working on the UGA
29 zoning issue and try to use them as a resource.
30
31 Crawford stated there was some talk about creating a fee or revenue - generating
32 mechanism to do some things in the watershed. When the Lake Whatcom Joint Councils
33 and Commissioners meet, they ought to talk about that. He would like to explore revenue -
34 generating methods to do projects on the watershed.
35
36 McShane asked if Councilmember Crawford is thinking of a flood subzone or
37 watershed district.
38
39 Crawford stated the property owners who live in the watershed and affect the
40 watershed should be a part of it and the water users should also be a part of it. Spread it
41 out so it's not so painful. Everyone who affects or uses Lake Whatcom water to participate,
42 then set goals of what they can do with that.
43
44 Brenner stated that is for folks outside the City.
45
46 Caskey - Schreiber stated City residents already have a fee.
47
48 Weimer stated the City may be open to looking at a different structure.
49
50 Nelson stated that might be worthwhile. When the County talked to the City before,
51 there was no inclination of doing that.
52
Committee of the Whole, 9/11/2007, Page 5
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McShane stated Ms. Craven can explore an issue in which a super - majority of
Councilmembers are interested. Councilmember Fleetwood had that in mind when they
talked about the resolution the Council passed. He's heard all the councilmembers talk
about it at one time or another. He asked if this is something the Council wants Ms. Craven
to explore.
Nelson stated it would be premature at this time. The City has its own stormwater
fee and programs. To have successful projects, the City and County must participate
together. That's why he suggested formulating a mechanism within the County by which
citizens can see the funding mechanisms and programs. Don't put together a district
without the ability to pay for the work involved.
Crawford stated include all water users, including the ones that (inaudible) withdraw.
Then they get this out of the stormwater venue.
McShane stated there are options.
looking at it.
OTHER BUSINESS
ADJOURN
He can't fully understand everything without
The meeting adjourned at approximately 7:00 p.m.
kJ L y
Jill Nixon, Minutes Transcription
`;h�+rlW n , b,QF.��;ed these minutes on October 23_, 2007.
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ATTv: 0��T',rrr� WHATCOM COUNTY COUNCIL
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ciOerk Carl Weimer, Council Chair
Committee of the Whole, 9/11/2007, Page 6