HomeMy WebLinkAboutPlanning Dec 6 2022Whatcom County
Council Planning and Development Committee
COUNTY COURTHOUSE
311 Grand Avenue, Ste #105
Bellingham, WA 98225-4038
(360) 778-5010
Committee Minutes - Final
Tuesday, December 6, 2022
2:40 PM
Hybrid Meeting
HYBRID MEETING - ADJOURNS BY 3:40 P.M.; MAY BEGIN EARLY
(PARTICIPATE IN -PERSON AT 311 GRAND AVENUE SUITE 105, SEE REMOTE
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360.778.5010)
COUNCILMEMBERS
Todd Donovan
Ben Elenbaas
Kaylee Galloway
CLERK OF THE COUNCIL
Dana Brown -Davis, C.M.C.
Council Planning and Development Committee Minutes - Final December 6, 2022
Committee
Call To Order
Roll Call
Committee Chair Ben Elenbaas called the meeting to order at 2:41 p.m. in a
hybrid meeting.
Present: 3 - Todd Donovan, Ben Elenbaas, and Kaylee Galloway
Absent: None
Also Present: Barry Buchanan, Tyler Byrd, and Carol Frazey
Announcements
Committee Discussion and Recommendation to Council
Elenbaas asked that they go out of agenda order and discuss this item first.
1. AB2022-627 Resolution approving recommendations on three applications for open space current
use assessment
Joshua Fleischmann, Planning and Development Services Department,
presented and answered whether the OSP2021-00004 - Intalco #1 acreage
is in the Heavy Industrial Zone area but probably could not be utilized
because of wetlands, and whether all three applications had both Planning
Commission and staff recommendations in favor.
Donovan moved that the Resolution be RECOMMENDED FOR
APPROVAL.
Fleischman answered why the Intalco land was not already zoned as Open
Space Land and whether there will be a difference in tax collection, whether
the Open Space designation on the Commercial Forestry property
(OSP2021-00003 Whatcom Land Trust) will affect the ability to harvest,
whether that property would still be in the inventory of the County's
resource lands if it is no longer harvestable, and whether the Open Space
designation would stop Whatcom Land Trust from actively managing the
forest if they decided to do that.
Donovan's motion that the Resolution be RECOMMENDED FOR
APPROVAL carried by the following vote:
Aye: 3 - Donovan, Elenbaas, and Galloway
Nay: 0
Absent: 0
Whatcom County Page 1
Council Planning and Development Committee Minutes - Final December 6, 2022
Committee
Committee Discussion
1. A132022-597 Discussion of the Buildable Lands Report
The following people spoke:
Perry Eskridge, Whatcom County Association of REALTORS
• Darcy Jones, Jones Engineers, Inc.
They voiced concerns that the report has no discussion about housing
availability and affordability and no reasonable measures included for a
housing affordability problem, the need for a specific finding addressing
infrastructure gaps, constraints on lands they are placing future density on
which may take away from real housing that could actually happen, and
permitted single family housing which may not necessarily be truly
detached single family homes and may not meet the 2016 Comprehensive
Plan goals.
The following people answered questions:
• Chris Behee, City of Bellingham
• Matt Aamot, Planning and Development Services Department
They answered whether the City of Bellingham is counting a remodeled
basement Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) as a single family residence,
whether the Council should be amending the findings of fact or requesting
the Planning Department to evaluate the questions and see if they want to
change their findings of fact so that there is a process and the facts are
substantiated, finding a way to close the gap between what is being said on
paper and what the community -lived experience is, what the City of Blaine
is saying about reasonable measures and whether the Council can do
anything if a city says their numbers are fine and they do not want to add
land capacity, how we fix this so that our documents (which paint a picture
that everything is good and there are not a lot of reasonable measures we
need to take in regards to available housing) match what we need to be doing
on the ground, and a concern that 85% of the marketplace is looking for a
single family residence while 85% of the permits in the City of Bellingham
were multi -family and that does not match.
Councilmembers and staff discussed the next steps, having the discussion in
Committee again and coming back with some revised findings, and pulling
the related item (AB2022-641) from introduction to give time to amend the
findings.
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Council Planning and Development Committee Minutes - Final
Committee
Donovan moved to recommend that the Council pull the item from
Introduction.
December 6, 2022
Councilmembers discussed whether they will need more than one
Committee session to be able to vote on it, and whether the County would
be out of compliance with any sort of deadlines if they push it off until the
end of January.
The motion carried by the following vote:
Aye: 3 - Donovan, Galloway, and Elenbaas
Nay: 0
This agenda item was DISCUSSED AND MOTION(S) APPROVED.
Items Added by Revision
Other Business
There were no agenda items added by revision.
There was no other business.
Adiournment
The meeting adjourned at 3:43 p.m.
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Dana Brown- i (i`c u e I Clerk
Kristi Felbinger, Minutes Transcription
WHATCOM COUNTY COUNCIL
WHATCOM COUNTY, WA
Ben Elenbaas-via email 12/9/2022
Ben Elenbaas, Committee Chair
Whatcom County Page 3