Public Policy Perspectives 2955 Sunset Drive, Bellingham, WA (360)

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1 Public Policy Perspectives 2955 Sunset Drive, Bellingham, WA (360) Memo: 12/16/10 Dear County Council, For nearly two years now the refrain excusing delay regarding important public planning initiatives has been, That will be part of the 2011 update. In about two weeks, it is 2011 and the planning work needed to be completed in 2010 by Whatcom County s cities and the county government for the 2011 process to proceed has not even begun nor, so far as the public can tell, is it scheduled to begin anytime soon. As just one example of work that should have already been completed, council should consider the fact that employment and population allocations for 2031 are initial steps in the 2011 planning update process. Has council seen anything to indicate what those projections might be and when they might be adopted? The cities and the general public need those projections and associated allocations to inform their own planning and comprehensive plan update processes. As explained to you in the 02/11/10 staff report, city planning efforts must be completed before the results of those efforts can be constructively integrated into the County Comprehensive Plan. It should be apparent to all, there cannot be a 2011 county update solving all our planning problems. Council should be asking: How can businesses plan future investments in a regulatory atmosphere threatening more land removals and on-going inability to do any new business at all in UGAs prior to annexation? The existing uncertainty is untenable and not the intent of the Growth Management act. How do we plan for affordable housing when residential growth in several City UGAs is restricted to one house per 40 acres on hundreds of acres currently zoned as Ag land of long term significance and one house per five or ten acres in the less restrictive UGAs? Public Policy Analysis For Application In Real World Situations Jack Petree, Clayton Petree

2 What are we really saying to our citizens when we tell them, Don t worry, it will all be resolved in the 2011 update, and then delay that update for an unknown number of years? It is this uncertainty that s led to the new pattern of growth revealed by OFM s data for Whatcom County in which 2/3 of all residential population growth is taking place outside our cities and their UGAs and business investment appears to have been crippled. Please consider the informational material attached dealing with the above as we pose questions regarding the 2011 update. Regards, Jack and Clayton Petree 2

3 CAN WHATCOM COUNTY ASSURE THE PUBLIC IT WILL PROVIDE CERTAINTY IN 2011? We believe the public and many of the cities have unanswered questions. Inadequacies in the ten year review such as a lack of a completed capital facilities plan and the analysis as to the effect of new laws were to be addressed by The upcoming housing element is as difficult a project as the land use element was. It was scheduled to begin in 2010 and has been delayed to an unknown date in All of the subarea plans are part of the comprehensive plan and must be updated to be consistent with the comprehensive plan. Some subarea plans haven t been updated in 10 to 20 years. The Bellingham subarea plan is already contains significant inconsistencies with the current comprehensive plan, without any changes that may come about as you prepare the 7 year comprehensive plan update. Your staff reported to you early in 2010 before staffing cuts were made that there are an inadequate number of planning staff to handle the update of the subarea plans. What about certainty for landowners, businesses, and others that would like to know if their land is to remain in a UGA or suddenly be yanked out as was done in 2009? Many challenges remain to the 2009 ten-year review and will move forward in 2011 if settlement has not occured. How is the public to participate when they do not know if they are UGA, downzoned to R10, are a new LAMIRD, or perhaps something else? JOB FORECAST AND POPULATION PROJECTION FOR NEXT TWENTY YEAR TIMEFRAME The Whatcom County 10 year review was deemed completed early in 2010 and was, according to State law, supposed to include revision of the County Comprehensive plan and each city comprehensive plan to accommodate the urban growth projected to occur for the succeeding twenty year period. The twenty-year period planned for is As you know, the 7 year comprehensive plan update was originally due in 2011 but there has been a legislative extension allowing the County and the cities to complete their 7 year update by Is the County still planning to complete their 7 year update in 2011 with the timeframe of , or is the County planning to complete the update in 2014 with a twenty year timeframe of ? If cities are planning to update their comprehensive plan now, what twenty year timeframe are they to plan for? What is their jobs forecast? What population allocation are they to plan for? What will Whatcom County do if the timeframes are not the same? If Whatcom County is planning to wait until 2014 to adopt the 7 year Comprehensive Plan update, RCW A C requires that the County used the more recent ten-year population forecast from OFM. OFM will release the next set of population forecasts in Will the county move forward now and complete the update before the new OFM projections are released? What will the county do if the update is not adopted before 2012? Your staff reported to you last February that new projections would make part or all of the previous work obsolete. BELLINGHAM IS ALREADY ONE YEAR BEHIND THEIR OWN SCHEDULE Late 2009, Bellingham established a timeline and scope for the upcoming 7 year comprehensive plan update. According to the materials on file, Bellingham was planning a 20 year planning period of and requires a new 2031 population, housing, and employment growth forecasts. The timeline discussed was that Bellingham staff would work on the update for the first 6 months of 2010, including work on an updated Environmental Impact Statement and new traffic analysis. This work has not been released and there has been no EIS scoping or public hearing for an EIS update available to the public over 1 year later. The second item discussed was planning commission review. This was to occur during the second 6 months of 2010 and staff estimated it would require 2 meetings on the topic each month. There has not been any planning commission meetings or a hearing on the 7 year comprehensive plan update in The last 3

4 phase of the 7 year update in Bellingham was to take the planning commission recommendation to the city council in January of The staff estimate was that it would take from 9 to 12 months to complete this work. This means that Bellingham is from 6 to 12 months behind their proposed timeline as we enter 2011 and if the original Bellingham timeline was realistic, than Bellingham cannot possibly complete their update in Below is a timeline turned in earlier this year discussing the various issues and challenges the Council may have in completing their review. APRIL 2009: Whatcom County requests an extension for its compliance period on the ten-year review specifically referencing the need to complete capital facilities planning before adopting the tenyear review. NOVEMBER 23, 2009: The County adopts Ordinance purporting to complete the County s ten- year review of its 1997 Comprehensive Plan. Director Stalheim informs the County Council that tasks the County was supposed to accomplish as part of its ten-year review, especially regarding the compliant public facilities plan the County received an extension of time to allow completion of, were deferred until 2011 despite the County s assertion in November the ten-year review had been completed. (Slide show presented to County Council Planning Committee Slide #17) Director Stalheim informs the County Council that cities and the County must meet a December 1, 2011 deadline for periodic review (7 year update). (Slide show slides 11 and 18) Director Stalheim informs the County Council that some of the work the County must adopt before Cities can complete their planning will not even be brought to the Council until Feb (Staff report 2/11/10 presented to Council February 23 Page 9 of 25 discussion of Fire Protection Levels of Service) FEBRUARY 23, 2010 The Director does not remind the Council that before the various cities can adopt compliant Comprehensive Plans, the Fire Districts serving them must first adopt capital facilities plans of their own after full public process meaning cities will not even get the planning documents until late 2011 pushing City work into Director Stalheim reminds the County Council some of the work required to complete the County s year update will not even come before the Council until (Staff report 2/11/10 presented to Council February 23 Page 9 of 25 discussion of Bellingham) The Director does not remind the Council that before Bellingham can address a population figure of 116,200 a new population projection must be adopted and Bellingham must be allocated a sufficient population growth to require the new projection. The effort needed to accomplish the task is not scheduled in the Director s work plan for

5 The Director does remind the Council that a three year extension to the 2011 deadline is likely to be passed by the legislature. He does not discuss what the impact on the schedule will be if one or more cities do not complete their planning by December of 2011 either because they do not wish to complete or cannot complete due to lack of appropriate County actions. The Director does remind the Council that completion of the work later than 2011 means new population projections will be provided by OFM making the work performed previously either completely or partially obsolete. The Council is reminded of this even as it is conceded the work will extend into 2012 (See Bellingham discussion above) 5