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HomeMy WebLinkAbout051 00 CQ '0 De..-D 5.?- 3 .c)è) ~. .} STATE OF WASHINGTON County of Jefferson A Resolution in the Matter of } Establishing that Jefferson County } Will Not Accept Proposed Comprehensive} Plan Amendments from Its Citizens } During 2000. } - RESOLUTION NO. 51-Do. WHEREAS, the first cycle of receiving, analyzing, discussing and voting upon amendments to the County's 1998 Comprehensive Plan has been completed by the County Commissioners nearly one year after it began; and WHEREAS, the fust cycle of Comprehensive Plan amendments has revealed that the policy language of the County's Comprehensive Plan, which directs the type and location ofland uses within the County, can only be implemented and applied by the planning staff of the Department of Community Development (or "DCD") through final development regulations; and WHEREAS, adoption of final development regulations will provide the County's residents with more certainty, i.e., a more accurate understanding of what types of rural commercial growth would be in conformance with the state's Growth Management Act and thus permissible under the County's Comprehensive Plan; and WHEREAS, if the County were to accept citizen-driven Comprehensive Plan amendment proposals in a "second" cycle of amendments before it held an accurate understanding of what types of rural commercial growth would be allowed pursuant to the state's Growth Management Act and the County's Comprehensive Plan, then such amendments would become a giant exercise in futility; and WHEREAS, the County has embarked on generating, reviewing and eventually enacting a new integrated set of final development regulations to be referred to as the Unified Development Code (UDC) with direction to expedite the adoption date so it occurs before the end of fiscal year 2000; and WHEREAS, the Commissioners have expressed the preference that the development regulations to be generated and eventually enacted should include provisions to fully implement certain language now extant in the Comprehensive Plan, for example, the portions of the Comprehensive Plan that encourage the generation and placement of home based and small businesses, small- scale tourist and recreational opportunities and the clustering of residences; and WHEREAS, the Commissioners have expressed the preference that the development regulations to be generated and eventually enacted should also include provisions for zoning based not only upon more flexible use tables but also should include, if appropriate, performance based standards; and . Resolution No. 51-00, Page 2 WHEREAS, the County Commissioners have been informed that hundreds and hundreds of hours of planners' time and attorney's time have been consumed as the County went through this first cycle of amendments; and WHEREAS, the Commissioners have previously directed the planning staff of the "DCD" to continue to move forward with the sub-area planning process for "South" County, the update of the County's Shoreline Master Program, planning and legal analysis regarding the Comprehensive Plan amendments relating to rural commercial development, and preparation of an informational fact sheet focusing on growth and development issues in the Tri-Area; and WHEREAS, to ask the County's "DCD" to devote the large amount of resources that would be needed to process a second cycle of Comprehensive Plan amendments and to 1) complete committed long range planning projects, including the UDC 2) the daily work of studying and reviewing land use permits filed regularly by citizens with the DCD, and 3) the staff support to the Planning Commission would undoubtedly be too burdensome upon the "DCD" staff and would surely lead to one or more of these tasks not receiving the attention it deserves; and WHEREAS, the County Commissioners have stated that their number one priority with respect to the work plan for staff of the "DCD", during the remaining seven months of fiscal year 2000, is to prepare the UDC for their adoption, and the Commissioners do not wish to overly burden the staff at the County's DCD; and WHEREAS, the staff of the "DCD" have provided the County Commissioners with a work program that details the number of professional planning staffhours that it can commit to the completion of its long range and current planning functions; and WHEREAS, the Growth Management Act does not require that a public entity such as Jefferson County that now plans pursuant to the Growth Management Act make available to its citizens an annual amendment process; and WHEREAS, the Jefferson County Comprehensive Plan does not require an annual amendment process as clearly stated in Policy LNP 1.3 as follows, " Review and amend the Comprehensive Plan on a minimum schedule of once every (5) years, and preferably on an annual basis, consistent with the requirements ofthe Growth Management Act. Revisions to the Land Use Map may be considered on an annual basis, and shall be in strict compliance with the Comprehensive Plan criteria."; and WHEREAS, a joint meeting between the Board of County Commissioners, the Planning. Commission, and County Staffwas recently held to discuss improvements to Jefferson County's Comprehensive Plan Amendment Process. The outcome of said meeting was a consensus on the need to improve the application, processing, timing and community dialogue surrounding amendments to the Comprehensive Plan; and WHEREAS, the Unified Development Code will include a distinct chapter to implement Policy LNP 1.3 that will establish procedures for amending the Comprehensive Plan, both map or "site- ,",- ,,' Resolution No. 5]-00 Page 3 specific" changes and textual or "policy" amendments, as well as codifying the formal procedure for amending the development regulations of the UDC; and WHEREAS, the County Commissioners agree that while an annual amendment process would be preferable, it does not have the financial resources or staffing capabilities to commit and that it is counterproductive to amend the Comprehensive Plan without having its already adopted policies appropriately implemented; NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED as follows: That Jefferson County, in order to conserve its staffing resources for other tasks deemed more urgent by the County Commissioners, will not, during the year 2000, accept horn any citizen or any citizen group any proposed site-specific or text (sometimes called "policy") amendments to the County's 1998 Comprehensive Plan; and This Resolution supplants and replaces any earlier Resolutions of this Board that have touched upon or related to the topic of possibly accepting a second "cycle" of proposed Comprehensive Plan amendments during the year 2000, Seal: ATTEST: ~V{ M~) Lorna Delaney, CMC Clerk of the Board -', " ", " ,," ,,( ";" '", ""'" , " r{-~. ~ '!, "', '" ,/" ..,;-., <?" 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