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GROWTH MANAGEMENT ACT |
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Email this page to a friend List of stories about Growth Management Act in San Juan County | |
Guesthouse issue will be on ballot and in courtposted 09/24/04
Tuesday, Sept. 21, 2004, Randy Gaylord told the commissioners an agreement was in sight. The BOCC was willing to place a cap on the number of guesthouses, restrictions on placement, and standards for appearance. These were in addition to the regulations already included in the current ADU rules. The negotiations have taken place in closed session. Commissioner John Evans said, "I don't like doing the public's business behind closed doors. The whole negotiation has been done in secret. I haven't been comfortable with that. To me this is like being held hostage by Enron." He was willing to go along with the compromises listed above, but drew the line at going any farther. He said the FOSj made another "set of demands" at 5:30 p.m. the previous Friday. "They want to change this, they want to change that. I have no faith in the veracity of people doing negotiations for the FOSJ. We have brought forward a compromise far beyond where the board originally started." Commissioners Rhea Miller and Darcie Nielsen agreed with Evans regarding the compromises but did not agree with his characterization of the Friends of the San Juans. At the end of the Tuesday commissioner meeting, plans were made to meet the next morning with representatives of the FOSJ to finalize the agreement. The meeting did not take place because FOSJ withdrew their support of the agreement after discovering the definition of dwelling unit being used. Prosecutor Randy Gaylord said the objection came as a surprise at the last minute. Maile Johnson of the FOSJ said a different definition was proposed from the beginning and she did not realize it wasn't being used until she read the final draft Tuesday evening. The county will continue with its appeal to the state Court of Appeals. Voters will be presented with a ballot question on the Nov. 2 ballot about guesthouses. Press Release by the Friends of the San JuansONE DWELLING UNIT + ONE DWELLING UNIT EQUALS TWO DWELLING UNITS, NOT ONE. FRIENDS REFUSE TO ACCEPT COMMISSIONERS DESIRE TO INCREASE ALLOWABLE DWELLING UNITS IN THE COUNTY WITHOUT COUNTING THEM posted 09/24/04
In 1992, San Juan County voters agreed to comprehensive planning under the state's Growth Management Act (GMA). The GMA Hearings Board determines density as one dwelling unit per parcel, with the parcel sizes varying by land use designation. The three commissioners have persisted in trying to allow two dwelling units per parcel, regardless of how small the parcel is, by sliding a second, detached, dwelling unit into the county's definition of the term "dwelling unit." As the GMA Hearings Board pointed out to the county commissioners and prosecuting attorney more than once in the past several years: 1 + 1 = 2. "The commissioners have a little trouble with math," said Maile Johnson, a FRIENDS Board member who spoke on Tuesday during a public meeting in Friday Harbor. "The county has already appealed the GMA decision to two courts and lost both times," continued Johnson. "We estimate that the litigation as a whole has cost San Juan taxpayers well over $100,000. Now the commissioners are appealing for the third time at additional taxpayer cost." Ms. Johnson is an attorney and acknowledged county-ordinance expert. In mid-August, FRIENDS made a written proposal to the Board of County Commissioners. This was an effort to initiate a "local solution" to the guesthouse impasse, as requested by the state legislators who came to the San Juans and visited a selection of guesthouses in August. All of the guesthouses showcased by the BOCC would be allowed under the Friends' recent proposals, which contained a clear definition of "dwelling unit." The three commissioners made a counter proposal in late August. FRIENDS made a counter-counter proposal in early September. In it, FRIENDS proposed the adoption of the successful Island County definition of a "dwelling unit." It is: "any building or portion thereof which contains living facilities including provisions for sleeping, cooking, eating, and sanitation, as required by Island County, for not more than one family. . . " As Jon Christoffersen, a FRIENDS director, put it, "FRIENDS has never agreed to any other definition. Two separate dwelling units on a piece of land do not add up to a single family dwelling, no matter how you twist it." On Tuesday, the commissioners turned their backs on the FRIENDS compromise proposal and proceeded to put a curious information-only vote on the November 2 ballot. The information-only ballot essentially asks voters whether or not they like guesthouses, but it does not in any way describe the potential impact of a Yes or No vote. Continuing litigation is one result, since the policy is illegal. "The result of widespread, uncounted guesthouses, as the commissioners want, could be devastating to the rural character of the San Juans. We already see road congestion, a shortage of fresh water supplies, and a growing cost to taxpayers of county-services," said Stephanie Buffum Field, Executive Director of FRIENDS. "There are about 17,000 parcels in the San Juans; roughly 8,000 of them are yet undeveloped. Imagine an extra dwelling unit eventually built on a large portion of them." "The county does not seem to understand the implications of not counting all separate dwelling units as dwelling units," said Brandt. "Perhaps all the parties involved should agree to jointly engage an experienced land use expert to help us resolve this critical and divisive issue. Then we could all avoid further litigation and spend our time and limited resources on such urgent matters as affordable housing, something the BOCC has refused to include in these negotiations." Press Release from San Juan County Commissioners: John Evans, Rhea Miller and Darcie Nielsenposted 09/23/04
In the morning of September 21, 2004, the San Juan County Board of County Commissioners confirmed their offer of a settlement. In that offer, the Commissioners said they would direct the Planners to prepare an ordinance for a public adoption process that would address all of the concerns raised by the Friends of the San Juans and others. Specifically the proposed ordinance would:
In addition, the Commissioners would consider three other issues at a later date as part of the annual amendment process. All that was required at the end of the September 21 meeting was for the paperwork to be signed. But at about 8:30 p.m. that evening, Maile Johnson called the prosecutor to say that the definition of "dwelling unit" used by the county since 1998 was unacceptable. The Prosecutor expressed surprise that this issue was raised to such a high stature of importance this late in the negotiation. The next day Ms. Johnson and Mr. Christoffersen did not appear with the Board of County Commissioners to sign the settlement agreement or explain their reasoning. All members of the Board of County Commissioners expressed regret over this turn of events. The Prosecuting Attorney has spent considerable time to personally attend to this matter, as settlement has been a high priority for the Commissioners. A copy of the County's settlement offer is available from the BOCC or the Office of the Prosecuting Attorney. The Commissioners agreed to continue with the advisory ballot. The County has filed its brief in the court appeal and is awaiting the brief of the challengers. In other action, state legislative groups are adding the guesthouse issue to their agendas as it has exploded to one of statewide significance, especially among housing groups. The Commissioners will continue to work with the Washington State Association of Counties, which has placed this issue on their legislative agenda for the 2005 state legislative session. Response from Maile Johson of the Friends of the San Juansposted 09/23/04
For several years now, Commissioners Evans, Nielsen, and Miller have said they wish to allow the construction of a second house (a detached, accessory dwelling that could be rented to tourists) on every one of roughly 17,000 parcels in the county. The Citizens' Group has opposed this policy and proposed less sweeping possibilities for detached guest houses. In effect, the commissioners would double the potential load on San Juan Countyıs fresh water, roads, services, etc. thus, most likely, significantly raising taxes as well as lowering our quality of life. The commissioners have already been turned down by the Growth Management Hearings Board on this matter, and have lost two Superior Court appeals on the same issue, spending hundreds of thousands of local tax dollars in their futile resistance to the Growth Management Act, to which they subscribed in 1992. The commissioners currently are appealing the Growth Management Hearings Board (GMHB) decisions for the third time, at considerable expense to the cash-strapped county. A detached guesthouse policy that doubles density is not now, nor will be, legal, regardless of the commissioner's wish that it were so. Two houses on every lot is not in keeping with the Vision Statement in the county's Comprehensive Plan, which reads: "We wish to retain our rural character." While SJC looks rural now, at buildout the average parcel size will be four acres per house. With unrestricted guest house development, the average parcel size will be two acres per house throughout the entire county. On Tuesday, the Citizens' Group and Friends of the San Juans discontinued negotiations with the BOCC. After a month of initiatives and intensive work to reach a local solution, they were insulted by Commissioner Evans in a public session. Evans was even insulting to his fellow commissioners and the Prosecuting Attorney, Randy Gaylord, who have been directly involved all the way with the effort to reach guest house peace. Maile Johnson and Jon Christoffersen, Friends' Board members, were present on Tuesday when the fourth version of a possible agreement was presented to the commissioners by Prosecutor Gaylord. Evans, who has been on sick leave for the last four weeks, lambasted everyone. He is currently running for re-election. GMA law on rural density is well established at one house per five acres, without detached guest houses. Internal, attached, and existing guest houses are and will remain perfectly legal and unrestricted. The Citizens' Group and Friends fully support that policy, which meets the needs of existing residents, may support affordable housing and will accommodate guests, relatives, and home and health care workers. The GMHB, the Citizens' Group and State legislators have encouraged BOCC to look to Island County's model, which is an example of a local solution that allows some impact on density via new detached guesthouses if the number is capped and thus limited in scope. Island County's successful model allows a fixed number per year of ADU permits. The Citizens' Group proposed this model to BOCC, including allowing four times the number of ADUs per capita as allowed in Island County. In adition they proposed some preference for affordable housing and protection for Natural, Conservancy and Critical Areas but BOCC has emphatically rejected those policies. BOCC would allow, in addition to a main house of unlimited size, a two-story 2000 square foot guesthouse with garage, with open-ended permission to be used for vacation rental, on lots as small as one acre. This would line our shorelines, which are of national significance, with two-story development and crowd existing neighbors with the transient rentals that are causing grief in neighborhoods where they currently exist. Negotiators for the Citizens' Group were bewildered when the last round of negotiations foundered on BOCCıs insistence on warping the definition of "dwelling unit", the state wide unit of measurement for density. This definition is also part of the Island County ordinance, and thus had been proposed to BOCC months ago. BOCC insists that a dwelling unit is a main house plus a second house. Logic and truth are that 1 + 1 = 2 and the GMHB has also ruled that one does not equal two. Indeed it asked what part of that is hard to understand. The County states that it limits the occupancy of a guest house and main house to one family, but it fails to tell the public that it defines "family" as an infinite number of related people and up to eight unrelated people who may occupy these two houses that it says constitute one dwelling. The public needs to know that the Citizens' Group and Friends initiated, and carried the ball on the negotiations. They made all the serious proposals, they made all the major concessions and have been made the target of Commissioner John Evans' unsubstantiated attacks in a public meeting. It is curious that San Juan County, of all counties in the state, has not complied with the anti-sprawl provisions of state law. What now? More taxpayer dollars unnecessarily dumped into the coffers of law firms, more wasted staff time, and more public huffing and puffing by county officials. BOCC has proposed a ballot measure on this issue that fails to disclose that unlimited detached guesthouses are illegal. Regrettably, this will confuse the issue and polarize the community. I still believe a fair settlement is the solution. |
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