HomeMy WebLinkAbout122021cabs03 o s Board of County Commissioners
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4s Coy O) 1820 Jefferson Street
k-s celw PO Box 1220
gx) Port Townsend, WA 98368
Kate Dean,District 1 Heidi Eisenhour,District 2 Greg Brotherton,District 3
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December 20, 2021
Angus Brodie, Uplands Deputy Supervisor
of Natural Resources
Washington Department
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P.O. Box 47014
Olympia, WA 98504-7014
ANGUS.BRODIE@dnr.wa.gov
Dear Mr. Brodie:
Thank your work and responsiveness to public testimony regarding Dabob Bay Trust Land Transfer and Inter-
Trust Exchange 86-100443.
We understand the challenges DNR faces with balancing timber and land values on the Forest Board and
Common School Trust properties being considered for exchange,the potential conservation constraints of
some parcels, and the lack of funds for updating an appraisal of common school lands. However, we think it is
possible for DNR to overcome these challenges.
DNR has been hampered in balancing land and timber values in the exchange due to the limited acreage of
School Trust lands in the Quilcene Fire District and the fact that County Commissioners and most of the public
requested that Common School Parcels 6,7, 11, 12, and 13 not be included as exchange parcels. This request
was made because of the conservation value of those School parcels. It was felt that for the County to take on
these parcels as Forest Board lands would present potential constraints to future timber harvest, as well as
the difficulty in protecting them through the TLT process once they became Forest Board lands (given the
shortage of Common School parcels for Inter-Trust Exchange). However, taking on some new Forest Board
lands with potential constraints is better than taking on no parcels at all.
Furthermore, since our letter was written, DNR has convened a TLT working group under legislative budget
proviso, including Commissioner Eisenhour, and published a report for the legislature in December that
recommends significant improvements to the TLT process, including a recommendation for using TLT directly
for Forest Board lands, rather than just for Common School lands.This change would allow TLT to compensate
the county directly for land and timber value on Forest board lands, without the need for Inter-Trust
Exchange. Although additional work remains to be done by the work group in 2022 to resolve how this will be
done, it appears that there is a viable path forward.
Phone (360) 385-9100 Fax (360) 385-9382 jeffbocc@co.jefferson.wa.us
With these proposed changes to TLT, and given the clear need for School Trust parcels to make the full Inter-
Trust exchange work well, we now recommend including all CS parcels in Quilcene Fire District for
consideration. Furthermore, after reviewing DNR's appraisal information on land and timber values for each
parcel, we suggest that a balanced trade in land and timber value could be achieved by using CS parcels 5, 6, 7,
11, 12, and 13 and 15 in combination with several other candidate parcels in the Quilcene Fire District.
Finally, we understand that DNR has depleted its funding to administer the TLT project and is short of funding
that may be needed to update an appraisal of Common School Trust lands. This updated appraisal may be
necessary to make use of$1.2 M in supplemental RCO grant funds to complete the project in full. However,
relative to the overall time and funding involved in this project,the cost of an updated appraisal represents a
small amount of additional funding needed. We certainly hope that DNR can find the additional funding
necessary to complete the project in full.
In summary, we urge DNR to complete the TLT and Inter-Trust Exchange for all of the state trust lands
remaining within the Dabob Bay Natura Area,while preserving the trusts of our junior taxing districts.
Sincerely,
Board of County Commissioners
Kate Dean,Chair Greg Brotherton Heidi Eisenhour
District 1 District 3 District 2
Cc: Hilary Franz, Commissioner of Public Lands
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