|
HISTORY
The Board of Island County Commissioners
adopted a set of interim control measures on
August 18, 2008 that regulate
commercial development along state route 532 on Camano
Island. The interim controls are intended to address
various shortfalls in the existing standards until more
appropriate guidelines are created.
In
response, the Board of Commissioners assembled a group
of Camano Islanders and assigned them the responsibility
of developing a draft proposal that would result in
modifications to the development standards applied to
commercially zoned properties on SR 532. A group of
20 Camano Islanders met with each other on 7 occasions
to talk through these issues. The members included local
developers, affected property owners, private citizens,
architects, and the local business community.
Amendments
have been developed that govern issues such as building
size, landscaping, minimum lot size, building setbacks,
signage, and building height. If adopted, these revisions
would amend the County Zoning Ordinance and the Island
County Comprehensive Plan by providing customized regulations for these properties.
These amendments have not gone into effect. The next
step was for the Island
County Planning Commission to holding formal hearings
to consider these amendments. The hearings were held on December 2, 2008,
January 27, 2009 and deliberations February 24, 2009. March 13, 2009 the
Planning Commission signed Findings of Fact and transmitted the ordinance to the
Board of County Commissioners for their consideration.
On April 1, 2009 the Board of Island County Commissioners
adopted C-36-09 to cover the short gap between the
expiration of the previous interim Ordinance C-86-08 and the date the Board of County Commissioners takes final action on the
amendments to the development regulations under consideration
The
Board of Island County Commissioners held two public hearings in Special Session on May 19, 2009 at the
Camano
Community Center on
Camano Island
on the following Ordinances:
C-57-09
[PLG-004-09] This
hearing considered whether or not to adopt a new zoning classification called the
Camano Gateway Village Zone and the development regulations applicable within
this new classification. The areas under consideration are the primary Camano
Gateway and The Terry’s Corner non-residential Rural Areas of Intensive
Development.
The
regulations consider the appropriateness of the types of land uses that may be
permitted and the regulations that govern such aspects as design, building size,
landscaping, density, minimum lot size, setbacks, site coverage ratios, signage,
and building height.
C-36-09 [PLG-005-09]
In the Matter of Adopting an Interim Official Control that Regulates Commercial
Development within The Terry’s Corner and Camano Gateway Non-Residential Areas
of Intensive Development.
The
Board of Commissioners adopted the Official Control on April 1, 2009 and was
required to hold a public hearing within 60 days of adoption. The Interim
Ordinance addresses the same development regulations along the primary gateway
to Camano Island and is intended to cover the short gap between the expiration
of the previous interim Ordinance C-86-08 and the date the Board of County
Commissioners takes final action on the amendments to the development
regulations under consideration in the first hearing C-57-09
[PLG-004-09].
The
Board of Commissioners voted to reject the Planning
Commission’s recommendation under Ordinance C-57-09
and directed staff to incorporate additional amendments
into the permanent regulations for further Board
consideration at a future public hearing.
The Board then reaffirmed their decision to adopt
interim official controls under Ordinance C-36-09.
INTERIM CONTROLS
The Board found
substantial progress has been made in developing
permanent regulations that will replace the interim
controls. The
process has experienced some minor delays related to
weather (cancellation of the
December 16, 2008
public hearing) and the need to redo the mandatory 60
day state agency review when it was discovered in
mid-March that CTED had not routed the materials when they were
received on October 31, 2008.
The delays related to these events have been on
the order of weeks rather than many months.
Nonetheless, the delays resulted in the
expiration of the first interim control (Ordinance
C-86-08). However,
progress has been continuous and without any intentional
interruption.
The Board is
taking advantage of its prerogative to conduct
additional public process related to the adoption of
permanent amendments.
The Board believes that the citizen working group
and the Planning Commission have gone to great strides
to involve the community and develop a set of extensive
and complicated development regulations in a short
period of time. The
Board believes that the permanent regulations will
benefit from some additional fine-tuning and has
therefore chosen to hold its own public hearings in
order to hear additional testimony and consider
additional modifications to the ordinance.
The first public hearing was held on
May 19, 2009
. An
additional public hearing will be held in July, 2009.
During this
period of additional consideration, the Board found it
is necessary to adopt a revised interim official control
that reflects that the majority of the citizen working
group’s suggestions and the Planning Commission’s
recommendations. The
Board has received a number of public comments
expressing opinions about the appropriateness of
overnight lodging and convenience services along this
stretch of SR 532. As
a result, the Board determined that the interim official
controls should temporarily prohibit those uses in order
to allow for full and proper public discourse on these
issues and to allow the Board to make a decision that
best reflects the desires of the community.
The language of
interim Ordinance C-36-09 is dramatically different than
the language of interim Ordinance C-86-08.
When Ordinance C-86-08 was adopted there was very
little information available that captured the opinions
of what Camano Islanders hoped to see in the Camano
Gateway. The
Board believes that because Ordinance C-36-09 is a
result of 7 citizen working group meetings and 3
Planning Commission meetings that these interim controls
better reflect the community vision.
The
new interim ordinance, reaffirmed at the hearing on May 19th went into effect
immediately and shall remain in effect for a period of six months, or as soon as
the evaluation and deliberation on amendments to the development regulations are
completed and adopted by the Board, whichever is earlier.
| Board
of Island County Ordinances - adopted or
under
consideration
(Click on ordinance for PDF copy) |
6-16-08
C-71-08 [PLG-010-08]
was adopted by the Board and scheduled for public
hearing on 8-4/08. 8/18/08
the Board repealed this ordinance.
8/18/06
C-86-08 [PLG-011-08]
was adopted
by the Board and scheduled for a public hearing
on 9/16/08 the Board reaffirmed this ordinance
8/25/08
C-89-08 [PLG-012-08] was adopted
by the Board (In the Matter of Adopting Findings
of Fact in Support of Ordinance C-71-08). (The
findings explain the reason why Ordinance C-71-08
was repealed)
9/16/08
C-86-08 [PLG-011-08] was reaffirmed
by the Board on 9/16/08 and then expired.
4/1/09
C-36-09 [PLG-005-09] was adopted by the
Board and scheduled for public hearing April 22,
2009 to cover the short gap between the expiration of
the first interim ordinance and action by the
Board on C-57-09. The
hearing was rescheduled to 5/19/09 and was then
reaffirmed after C-57-09 was rejected.
C-57-09
[PLG-004-09] was
set for public hearing on 5/19/09 and then
rejected by the Board in order to conduct
additional public process related to the adoption
of permanent amendments.
|
|
A
Division of Island County Government
