Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay.

Welcome to our Planning Commission meeting on June 17th. Let's rise for the pledge.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Amen. Amen.

We, let's do the roll call and we'll start with Jennifer Davis.

Present.

Right. And with Connor Davis is, I don't see him here. Commissioner Hooksford.

Present, thank you.

Commissioner Durer? Here. Commissioner Morton is here. Commissioner Lewandowski is not here for medical reasons, I'm told. And so I'd like the motion for excusing her.

I would move to excuse the commissioner.

All in favor? Aye.

Maybe give Commissioner Davis a few bullets.

That's fine. We're not going to wait, but before we excuse him or not excuse him, we'll hold off on that. Okay, great. In the meantime, let's pause the roll call and let's go to guest business. Anybody in the room that wishes to speak to the commission? Anybody online? Okay. Let's move on to, okay. Has anyone had a chance to look at the meeting minutes from last meeting? Anything that is not according to their memory?

I have no changes and would approve the meeting minutes as written.

Do we have a motion? I guess that's a motion. Or is that a motion? Can we move? I'm looking for a motion to approve the minutes.

I make the motion to approve the minutes as written.

I will second that. Any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor? Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed? All right. So let's go on. Yesterday was the last day of school. So I'm sure Connor is adjusting to the summer here. And he may have just forgotten everything because he's suddenly free. So hopefully he comes in. In the meantime, if he doesn't make it by the end of the meeting, then we'll Christopher McConkey- deal with him. Christopher McConkey- Appropriate.

Christopher McConkey- Excuse. Christopher McConkey- Okay.

Christopher McConkey- All right, so okay. Christopher McConkey- All right, make it an excuse them. Christopher McConkey- Not yet, though. All right. Christopher McConkey- Meanwhile, discussion items, the critical areas update from. Christopher McConkey- Planner and Levitan.

David Levitin, All right, thank you chair Morton David levitan principal planner so we're here tonight wanted to just share the latest draft of the critical areas ordinance we the planning Commission last reviewed this a few months ago I guess it was about four or five months ago back at the end of January. David Levitin, We had kind of chatted with her consultants after and we're waiting for a few updates and then ultimately we decided to do some of the work ourselves. which kind of delayed things a little bit. But before we move forward with the public hearings before the Planning Commission and then ultimately the City Council later in the summer and early into the fall, we just wanted to share and highlight a couple of the kind of substantive changes that have been made since you reviewed the last draft. And so I'm going to do a really quick PowerPoint and then I'm actually going to share. We had talked a little bit at the last meeting About the stream buffers and the different approaches and so Jill need them, one of our planners and GIS guru is developed. Some draft map she wants to go back in and update some of the data, but I just wanted to show you kind of what that looks like some basically we're planning on sharing. This publicly via a story map just to kind of show the public, the differences between having say 150 foot buffer. The existing hundred foot buffer 235 foot buffer, how that impacts how that extends on to adjacent properties, how it potentially limits development. So just wanted to give you a quick look at that before we launch that in the next few weeks. So let me go ahead and share my screen. All right, so just this is a little bit of a recap of the last meeting I won't go into detail, but this is our state mandated critical areas ordinance updates. codified in Chapter 1488 of the municipal code. So it basically covers all of our critical areas, with the exception of things like the shoreline of the lake and anything within. 200 feet of a shoreline of the state. So that includes some of our bigger streams and rivers. Those are covered by the shoreline master program. So those will be addressed in a future update to the SMP. We are going to be having we've had a kind of initial review by some of the agencies, but when we circulate our official draft as part of the 60-day review. It'll be reviewed by Commerce, Ecology, Fish and Wildlife, Department of Natural Resources, a couple of other different agencies, as well as by tribes and by the general public. And as I mentioned, the last draft was shared back at the end of January, and there have been a couple of substantive changes since then. So again, this is just kind of a recap. Don't really need to get into this. Just kind of jumping right into it. One of the bigger changes we had, we had talked about kind of the recommendation from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife for WDFW has been to utilize what's called site potential tree height when establishing riparian management zones, basically the areas adjacent to streams and So what that would do is in an area like Lake Stevens that historically kind of pre-development had the potential for very tall trees. It looks at the maximum potential tree height for our 200 year old tree species. Doesn't need to be existing. It could have been historic. It could just have the potential to be within that riparian area. So for a lot of Lake Stevens that put, would put our corresponding stream buffers up and over 200 feet, even for non-fish bearing streams. So we wanted to look at alternatives to that and develop some best available science to help support the deviation from that fish and wildlife recommended model. So we had proposed 150 foot buffer for type F or fish bearing streams. So that's some of the major ones like Lundeen and Kokanee, basically ones that feed in and out of the lake. And as opposed to using that full site potential tree height, Since that time, we've kind of had some additional conversations with our consultants, discussed it internally, and came up with essentially a hybrid approach where there is a standard buffer of 150 feet, but based off of kind of our review of a site-specific critical areas report, that there may be the need to expand that 150 foot buffer for fish bearing streams all the way up to that, you know, potentially 235, 239 foot buffer. So that's some of the language that's shown there on the right. It's included on pages 30 and 31 of your packet. And we had a good conversation, Christy and I did yesterday with our public works surface water division yesterday. They're developing a basins plan for our different watersheds. And they actually have some pretty good tree canopy data that we can use as part of our best available science review. To really support that a lot of these tree species that exist are really in that hundred and 50 foot maximum range as far as what currently exists so having that best available science reflect kind of. Both existing conditions and kind of more realistic potential conditions, as opposed to just the hypothetical maximum that could occur historically. and is probably unlikely to occur in kind of a post-development situation, you know, prior to the 1900s or after the 1900s. So that information has been helpful, and we're going to be incorporating that over the next couple of weeks and rolling out some of that information. So again, across the board, we have at least a hundred foot buffer. Basically that's the best available science shows that even for non-fish bearing streams, so type NP, which are perennial streams and type NS, which are seasonal streams, we're bumping that 50 foot buffer up to a hundred feet because the best available science does show that you need at least a hundred feet for water quality and habitat function, even for non-fish bearing streams. So just wanted to share that. Commissioners are welcome to jump in if they have questions as I'm going through this. There aren't a whole lot of slides or else we can just kind of get to the end and scroll back. So either preference.

Can I jump in right now? Yeah. I pulled the packet, believe it or not.

I keep things from our January conversation.

And there was a discussion about an overlay of what was available land versus what was, what this would impact. So again, most of it's built, but what would this impact with the available land use?

Yeah, let me actually, that's probably a good segue. Let me kind of show the map and some of the analysis that we've doing, because that's basically what Jill has been trying to do is kind of analyze development potential and how the different alternatives would impact that. So let me actually go in there.

And while Dave's doing that, I'll just interject a little bit going back to this site potential tree height versus this standard buffer. So as Dave mentioned, the 100 feet is what Fish and Wildlife has found to have the most efficacy, again, for water quality treatment, etc. And then you have diminishing returns sort of after that. So the idea is if we have existing regulations in place that would help improve that outer buffer such as our stormwater controls and things like that those already mitigate you know that extra five percent of function that you would get with the extra 100 to 150 feet so that's why we we feel confident you know again we can start at 100 feet And then graduate up versus, you know, on the type because we do have existing code that's already going to protect these critical areas from another perspective.

Yeah, so this is a map that Jill has kind of developed and she wants to go back in and tweak it a little bit. But so this one right here, my beautiful pink cursor. Is a non fish bearing stream, so it would have under our preferred alternative 100 foot buffer so that's the purple area if we went to a site potential tree height that was 235 feet. Because of the tree species that exists at least historically within this area, it would add another 135 feet so more than double it. When you look at a lot of our lots, especially within our single family residential a lot of them are only 60 7580 hundred feet wide. So you're gobbling up multiple lots on each side by more than doubling the buffer. So Jill did kind of a preliminary analysis looking at the potential that going with this alternative would add approximately 300 units, 278 units. So that was a 31% increase over the WDFW alternative and that it would basically kind of save approximately 50 acres of buildable land that would otherwise be kind of consumed by critical areas constraints by using that site potential tree height. When you look at an area like this, I mean, we do need to factor in some of these streams are either underground or they're piped. So it's not going to be, you know, an open stream channel in every situation. And so they, the implementation of this is going to be a little bit different depending on where you are in the city, but there are plenty of areas that do have open stream channels and very similar that You know 100 going from 50 feet 200 feet is already going to be an increase in effect potential development if you more than double that up to 235. You know, you do have the potential to be eaten up a whole lot of additional acres and when you when we're having to weigh or critical areas protections against our residential or housing growth targets. These are all things that need to be balanced and that's why we do this additional best available science review so we can kind of introduce those topics and kind of show how our regulations and as Russ noted in combinations with some of our other environmental protections, our stormwater regulations, some of the other things that are on the books, that they still do provide more than adequate environmental protections when it comes to streams and riparian areas. So this is a non-fish bearing stream. This is a fish bearing stream. So it has a slightly larger buffer, the 150 foot buffer. But as you can see, it still extends out about another 85 feet. So all of these properties along here and here that aren't impacted under kind of the preferred alternative would be. And we'll get into it a little bit more. They're also one of the other points that I'm going to talk about. And that I included on this handout that somehow this section of the code hadn't been included in the draft that was shared online as the concept of disconnected buffer. So, you know, say you had a stream that was running along the south side here of 20th. And then there was, you know, a road or a house and it completely disconnected it. Those are all things that need to be factored in as well. And that's why it's important for all of these development proposals to have site-specific critical areas reports because it's hard to just implement the code without the, you know, accounting for site-specific conditions. So we do require a site-specific critical areas report. We just want to make sure that our critical areas inventory that we establish that will essentially be the default that people look at before they need to prepare that critical areas report. report is as accurate and as as reflective of necessary environmental protections balance with needs for growth and development in Lake Stevens so

that's kind of a lot of information but if you look at this map to just sort of reinforce that point most of the area in this pinkish red those would be excluded because you as you can see those areas are already fully developed so there is a functional disconnect so those would be examples i think to your question uh commissioner huxford that would not be required to follow these new regulations because we can't practically administer those regulations on fully developed lots. So it really is going to have most application. And I know Jill is working on this on vacant parcels. And frankly, the only where we're going to see that they're already in largely protected areas such as Lundeen Creek, which is already has that established. floodplain zone and river migration zone. So in the majority of the city, I don't think we'll be able to implement these full buffers, even if that's the requirement, just because it wouldn't be a reasonable way to administer those. So there you go. That's the example I was talking about. So

I have more questions. I have questions, but I want to wait for you.

Okay, did while I'm on the map before I jump back in. Well, there's only a couple more slides in the PowerPoint happy to answer any questions if you if it's related to the map or this general concept. Maybe it might be best to talk about that now.

Yes, Commissioner Morton. Yeah, I do have questions about the map. So I really appreciate that you're looking at the delta of the acreage and the number of units, potential housing units that we are gaining back by having a reduced buffer from what the fish and wildlife want. Do you have an estimate of how much we're losing by increasing the buffers by 50 feet from what it currently is?

We do. I think that she's run that as well. It's not included in this one, but that's something that we can, you know, as we bring back the package to you as you're considering even the bump up.

um to 100 feet and 150 feet we can quantify uh that value yeah i'd be interested in seeing that and i think um information like that um which is being imposed by fish and wildlife which is a department of the of the state We could take that data and go to another department. I've mentioned this before. We can take that data and go to another department of the government, which determines our urban growth boundaries and say, look, fish and wildlife has taken this amount of acreage and numbered vocal units from us. and go to the other department and say we need at least this much more because our urban growth area is getting smaller because of fish and wildlife we need in addition to all the population that we are increasing we need to increase for this additional reason our our urban growth area uh it just it's just one more argument in our favor to uh for the applications that have been denied uh repeatedly or um when those rare opportunities come i think about every five to ten years or something like that so uh because this is a functionally a reduction in our in our uh in our regrowth area

Yeah, no, I think that's an accurate representation. I think for the purposes of the increase for the non-fish bearing streams from 50 to 100, I think the 100 feet is pretty clearly the kind of the minimum necessary, the best available science shows that, that we really do need to bump that up to 100 feet. So I think there's, we can provide the analysis of what's lost adjacent to non-fish bearing streams by going from 50 to 100, but I think we are, at least the staff recommendation, we're pretty set that We can't really see a lot of these state agencies kind of giving our code their blessing if we don't at least go up to the 100 feet for the non-fish bearing streams, just because you really do need that, both for the habitat and the water quality.

Well, yes. For environmental purposes, yes, the stream buffers are needed. But then again, this is an urban area, an urban area. the purpose of urban areas is for housing people, not for wildlife. And yes, we don't want to totally destroy the environment, but we need to allow urban growth in the urban areas. And especially with a huge number of just even seasonal streams that are little rivulets. Like you've got... little bump outs in these uh and that look like there's no stream there but it's it's a little bit of a divot in the ground and yes occasionally water will flow

would i would like to maybe uh ask maybe is there an alternative you know commissioner commissioner morton uh suggesting that we go back to the state and uh you know increase the uga uh size is is another option to basically say look fishing game is taking away a buildable area therefore we need to right size or adjust appropriately downward The expected growth trend for residential and commercial based on the removal of buildable lands from our from our region.

I think that would be probably more difficult just given that, you know, the population, the population option is you just concrete it in like terrible. When you look at the way from a growth targets perspective. I mean, when you look at the way that it all filters down from this at the state level, what the projection is for the state of Washington over the next 20, 25 years, and then that's allocated to counties and then counties work collaboratively to allocate that county wide growth to cities. I think it's something that maybe could be factored in to the intra-county discussion when the various county jurisdictions are allocating the growth targets that if you wanted to say, hey, we're much more encumbered by critical areas than downtown Everett is, that might be a discussion. But I think it would be hard at the countywide level and especially at the state level to be like, hey, I know that you've projected that we're going to add another million people, but maybe let's make that 700,000 instead. So I think that would be a little bit more difficult to do. And I think I do want to touch just on the buffer issue and the impacts. Again, this is going to have the most impact in kind of greenfield development situations that are basically undeveloped. Jennifer Davis with a question. Oh, she's on there too. Okay. Yes. Sorry.

I just wanted to add one quick thing before we move on, which is and kind of get confirmation that my understanding is correct, because we've been talking a little bit about balancing. Commissioner Morton was talking about balancing the need for our buildable lands, but also balancing that with protection of the environment for the purposes of wildlife and just general environmental concerns for critical areas. But am I correct in my understanding that there's a third component to be balancing, which is recharging the aquifer for potable water for human consumption as well?

Yeah, so there is the aquifer component and we do have the new regulations because our regulations are currently lacking CARA protections. So that is, you know, that's a different type of critical area. It's one of the five defined critical areas at the statewide level within the WAC and the RCW. So we do need to develop those. I haven't focused on those. We kind of talked about those the last time, kind of establishing those basically aquifer protection areas. And that does limit development. It both limits specific development and then establishes buffer around these aquifers and these wells and these other wellhead protection areas. So there are going to be those additional items. There's a lot of overlap. A lot of times, obviously, between, you know, there'll be streams and aquifers generally within the same general area. But they are kind of different. One is obviously surface water and one isn't. And so they're slightly different. But, you know, we will still have adequate protections for the aquifer areas to make sure that we're not having a potentially detrimental environmental impact on potable drinking water.

Thank you.

So yeah, kind of talking about this, I think this is actually a good segue into kind of the discussion of the disconnected buffers, because that does factor in that is a big part of development anywhere within kind of the majority of Lake Stevens where you already have subdivisions and commercial development pretty much everywhere. And that's, so let me go ahead and stop sharing this again.

Chair, with your permission, can I make sure that our guest has this?

Yeah, I have more if you need one more down there as well. So this is another of the recent changes, and that's somehow the version that I shared had kind of excluded this. So this would be in a new section 1488-296. We did include a definition on page seven, but then it references the section that Don't exist. And I'm sure all of you went through this with a fine tooth comb and all all noted that. So I want to apologize. So So basically, this is trying to address the situation, say that there was a stream on the other side of Main Street. And it had, you know, it was fish burying and it had 150 foot buffer, but it had Main Street right in the middle of it. It was, you know, had a stream channel right there. The buffer technically would probably extend all the way into this building, but we have a building, legally constructed building here. We have Main Street. Basically, it's impairing all of the buffer functions, so it doesn't really make a whole lot of sense for you to deem that area to be a buffer to the stream that exists. So the whole concept of this and what we were trying to do in as succinct a way as possible is to define kind of what constitutes significant development. And basically very kind of clearly stating that when you do have the significant development that interrupts or, you know, greatly reduces buffer function and functionally disconnects it from the critical area that the buffer is attached to, that that area is no longer considered part of the buffer. So this would be considered fully developable because it's already all paved. It's functionally disconnected by the road. So we want to have as clear of language as possible. We had done a code interpretation a couple years ago, Russ had issued. And so that had a lot of good information and brought in things and kind of referenced things such as the stormwater regulations that are in place and that we already have kind of adequate environmental infrastructure in place to handle a lot of these issues. So we just wanted to make sure that that was within the code. So that's basically the section that reeds that's kind of searing your eyeballs with the red text. And so again, there's going to be a lot of areas of like Steven say that used to have a 50 foot buffer because they were adjacent to perennial non fish bearing stream. And that bumping up from 50 to a hundred feet is potentially going to completely encroach into a property. But if that area has already been completely paved and graded developed as a driveway, All of that stuff that disconnects it from the adjacent stream that whole area and everything kind of on the essentially the landlord side of that development. would be considered functionally disconnected from the critical area so none of that area would be considered to be within the buffer. So just wanted to clarify that is that doesn't need to be factored in and that's really the importance of the site specific critical area study is to basically. They need to show. And we wanted to make sure that there's language in there that, you know, a qualified biologist needs to show. You have lost all of your buffer function. It shouldn't be considered part of the buffer anymore. So, you know, when we're modeling and we're developing maps and modeling and all of that, you know, unless we really get into every specific property and look at a surfaces and structures and all of that, it's hard for us to, we'd have to go in and kind of just X out all of those areas. So it's probably going to be hard to illustrate that at the citywide level. But we can definitely show some examples, you know, especially if the Planning Commission thinks that would be helpful. We've had various examples recently, or we could just kind of show hypothetical situations. I think it is important. You know, it's an important concept to understand because just because you establish a much larger stream buffer doesn't mean that it's going to totally encumber a site.

Can I interject another thought? So, Director Wright, for the record. So, also, as we're doing these site-specific reports and as we're spending time on these areas with functional disconnect, it's actually a positive gain also for environmental protection because right now we will get some reports that come in that will say, oh, I have 100 feet, 200 feet of a football field of grass. Therefore, it's pre-developed and I get to exclude all of that. Well, no, you don't. Because it still has buffer function. It doesn't have complete buffer function, but it still has buffer function. So it really will help us if we have very specific criteria. we can not argue with people about if they want to develop into that area and encroach all the way to a stream because they say, oh, we have a football field worth of grass, so we get to develop all of this. It also helps us take that argument out of the equation so we are able to put these adequate buffers into place. So it'll do two things when we have a more descriptive and defined functional disconnect section.

If I can run a scenario, then let's say, you know, you own a property properties that's the 75 foot range so would be now included in potentially in that zone. It's a half acre property. It's got a single house on it. And that house is functional, but ramshackle. And it's been decided to knock that house down, work with planning to split that lot. Could they functionally split that lot into two quarter acre properties, single family home?

Maybe. So that's the honest answer. So depending on where... that buffer lies because that would be an intensification of the use. There are current exceptions in our code that allow expansions of single family homes, and we have other provisions. What we can't do is create what's called a reasonable use lot. So if the subdivision would create a reasonable use lot, we couldn't do it. And we have done things like this where people will do what's called a unit lot subdivision and a duplex where they can minimize the footprint and still get two units through a less impactful way of doing a subdivision. So there would be alternatives, but I can't say yes or no without, again, the site-specific analysis. But those are some of the things that are already protected. Like you could replace your existing home. You could replace and expand your home. Existing home and then looking for through reasonable use alternative, you know, what's the highest and best use and what have you modeled for alternatives with the least amount of impact?

So it could stand to reason that taking a single family home, putting, you know, two single family homes on that same piece of property in one of these areas could be in the future very difficult. Not impossible, but difficult.

There would be some extra steps. Well, I mean, it would be the same steps we have today. That wouldn't change. It would be just the area of influence might be greater.

This is Commissioner Morton. There's a section I think that would apply to what Commissioner Durer is talking about, and that's the non-conforming activities. It says, except in cases of discontinuance, as part of this is on page uh 27 of the packet uh except for cases of discontinuance as part of a normal agricultural no wait no says uh if a non-conforming activity is discontinued for 180 days in other words a ramshackle house is not lived in for six months any resumption of activities shall conform to this chapter in other words you can't can't rebuild it. And then the next one is even more applicable. If nonconforming use or activity is destroyed by human activities, in other words, you tear down a house, or natural curtains, or a tornado tears down a house, it shall not be resumed except in conformity with the provisions of this chapter. So what that means to me is that redevelopment, improvement, or repair within those buffers is not allowed.

So there is a slight kind of difference between a non-conforming use and a non-conforming development. Kind of when you're talking about non-conforming uses, it's more about the actual use as opposed to the physical structures. If you have a non-conforming use and then, you know, You want to do something to it or it becomes vacant for a certain amount of time you basically you you lose that nonconformity when it comes to nonconforming developments and specifically as it relates. To our discussion related to buffer function and areas that are permanently disturbed. You might have a nonconforming use it goes away that doesn't mean that you still don't have that buffer interruption that you don't still have. Kind of hypothetically let's say you had you know and Commissioner doors example you had. a house that's right in the middle of a large property and the driveway runs right in the middle, up the middle, and you have a stream on the western third of the site. And the driveway and the existing house and the back patio completely separates the west side of the property from the perceived buffer function on the east side. You know, even if that 100 feet extends all the way to the eastern property line, that area would still not be considered part of the buffer even if, say, hypothetically, the use that was in that building was a non-conforming use. You might lose some of your vested use provisions, but it doesn't mean that you wouldn't be able to develop the site under the critical areas ordinance because there would still be complete buffer disconnection and loss of buffer function on that eastern half. So you still may be able to build something new, not just in the existing footprint where it has been already disturbed, but on the eastern half you might be able to put in another house as well because it's been completely disconnected from the natural resource that's on the western side of the property.

Christy Schmidt, Planning Manager. And as you can see, based on the examples that have been thrown out here this evening, To go back to Dave and ours discussion with our surface water environmental services department is that we'll be bringing forth some additional information with mapping where you can really see the increase of stream buffers and how it impacts the city. And we'll bring back some more specific examples because the code is being built to really focus and build on the site specifics of each site. to allow them that flexibility with the code. Because we think that the blanket large buffer is not appropriate for late Stevens. So what we're doing is gathering our data, our information to be able to justify that. So we will be bringing more information back to you.

Okay. Yeah. Yeah, that's one of the things I wanted to ask about. I see that you've got, like, the wording is flexible, meaning that you've got minimums of 100, 150 feet, depending on the type. But there's wording in here that allows for making that wider, depending on what's already there.

It's for the type for the type of specifically because of the fish habitat, but but for the ns and ns that flexibility that there would only. The way that we're proposing that there would only be a standard buffer of 100 feet for type ns and type NP there wouldn't be the the the opportunity to bump that up or basically high in that flexible. site potential tree height aligned buffer to fish habitat within that riparian management zone because that's kind of what the best available science that you need potentially a wider buffer to accommodate you know obviously the aquatic species and then the terrestrial species that exist within those riparian areas okay

I just wanted to add one more thing to this discussion back to your comment. So existing Section 1488-220, Allowed Activities, it specifically discusses what you're talking about where... normal maintenance repair isn't allowed activity, minor expansion or uses of structures existing at the time of the adoption of this code, which are in compliance, can do that up to a thousand square feet. So there are other sections of the critical areas code that have to be read in concert with what you're describing in this other section.

Got it, got it. Okay, yeah. I didn't read everything. No, that's fine. There's a lot there.

May I stay in that section and ask an additional? Are you okay? Go ahead. 1488-200, no person shall take action which results in any alteration of these critical areas. Who is monitoring that?

The neighbors.

Well, it's in this city, we are complaint driven. So the city is not going out and looking at every home and making those determinations. If we receive a report of a violation, we investigate and take appropriate actions. But the premise is that modifications of critical areas require a permit action by the city.

That was a leading question because I have a citizen that has called me and is trying to make a citizen's complaint to get compliance out. And evidently the website is not conducive to allowing that right now. I don't know what's going on, but she is not able to make that happen.

Okay.

So we do have a compliance officer on staff.

We do.

Is it only through the website? No. Can a phone call be made? Absolutely. Okay.

You can call just the city hall main number and ask for the code enforcement.

That question is asked and answered. The other question that I have. And I wrote it when we spoke about this in January. And again, I don't know where it applies what we're looking at tonight, but I said change in use Hartford. And again, full disclosure, I have ownership in Hartford, but evidently something in our discussion in January had me make the note that there was change in use for Hartford. What's happening in that area? Yeah.

I think that was probably related to the credit clock for recharge areas, because there are some basically that would be I'd have to pull it up on my screen. Far northeast in the far northeast corner, so we have all new regulations, because we don't currently have them and those do regulate specific uses if they're within a certain distance or travel time. for basically, you know, water and potential pollutants to travel, that they want to make sure that if you have a heavy industrial use within a certain distance of, you know, a protected aquifer or protected wellhead protection area, you know, that we have things in place regulating certain uses just to ensure compatibility. Again, it would be If their existing businesses, a lot of that stuff. If it were deemed non conforming, it would be considered a non conforming use. But if it continued, it would have some of the protections under our non conforming code. So I can't really speak to exactly. But I think I do remember us having this discussion related to Hartford and I think was mostly focused on the critical aquifer recharge area protections. Because it does establish some regulated and some prohibited uses within that section of the code.

okay i have one final question and then hopefully that is the last for the evening for me but um those of you that were on uh commission with me when we had we have a storm runoff that comes through our property here in lake stevens and it failed and it was our responsibility then to correct that that pipe, basically the storm water runoff that goes into the lake. And it landed on us as the homeowner to correct that. And I'm wondering where in all of this planning does it fall on the actual homeowner if there's a stormwater drainage issue or if there is some sort of flooding, which we've had in the past. But where is it? We're being regulated by the city and state, but then at the same time, when something fails, it's the homeowner's responsibility. And I'm wondering where that line is drawn and how that can be made clear.

I think it would be out of the scope of this project, but we do get those questions throughout the year and work with those homeowners and affected property owners in situations like that.

Right. Out of the scope perhaps here, but may come up in public comment, because if you're not allowing me to develop property in a certain area, but yet I'm liable for all of that wet land that is in that area, then I'm going to catch 22. Yep.

And for the record, our code enforcement portal is working.

Okay, good. I can't wait to tell her. I've been called. You just have to create a login. I've been called repeatedly.

I did have one question that's in an area that we haven't touched on. And that is 1488-220 section... L, and it's the new two. It's at the bottom of page 14 of the packet, or eight of the document. And it says, a wetland does not contain breeding population of any amphibian species. And there's a reason that it's limited to amphibians, because there are other protected or threatened populations that are fish or birds or mammals or whatnot.

Yes, amphibians, that has been one of the, we'll say, wetland buffer-related species that probably get hit harder. And because they need large woody debris or stinted vegetation is where they lay their eggs. And so when those habitats collapse, within buffers are degraded, they are probably unequally hampered by upland activities versus it's in water activities that are going to be affecting, you know, fish and some other birds. But yes, DFW has definitely called out protection of amphibians as a priority for at least the last 10, 15 years. Okay.

And I think that was a change that was made as part of the last major update in 2019. Because, yeah, I remember seeing some similar changes in other jurisdictions as well. All right.

I've got more questions. I'm sorry. I've got so many questions because this potentially impacts thousands of homeowners in the city. Well, first of all, have you gotten approval for this from Fish and Wildlife yet? Or is this what you feel strongly that this will get approved from Fish and Wildlife?

This is what we're proposing to share with Fish and Wildlife and with others. This is essentially, conceptually, the 150 with the kind of hybrid approach for fish-bearing streams is what we're planning on sharing. We essentially, we haven't issued our 60-day notice we've had kind of informal reviews from a couple different agencies including fish and wildlife and at first they were fairly supportive of the 150 for type f and then as i wouldn't say that they've necessarily gone in the other direction they've more been pointing out various jurisdictions through the state who've been challenged at kind of at the growth monitoring hearings board, sorry, growth management hearings board, as far as that, you know, environmental organizations have challenged cities that haven't used the site potential tree height model by saying that their code doesn't reflect best available science, which is a requirement in state law. So that's why we have been very kind of taken a little bit longer, been very deliberate, tried to develop our best available science documentation, tried to align it with our basins plan. But kind of answering, kind of circling back and actually answering your question, we haven't had a formal review yet, but this is what we are proposing.

And what we're proposing is very consistent with what other jurisdictions have approved and adopted.

Okay. Without challenge.

Christy Schmidt, planning manager. We're pretty fortunate that we've waited because we have what I'll call the data advantage of being at the end. Because we can go through and assess and look at what all the other cities have provided for their rationale and justification. And that's exactly what we've done. We've collected Dave's analysis. We've looked at it and compared with Russ and our consultant to see, hey, how does this line up? with City of Lake Stevens. How do we fit? Is it applicable? So we've taken those applicable parts and we're using them for our rationale for our city and then our site-specific tree height of what we can do. So we're trying to ball it all together and We feel we're in a pretty good position, fingers crossed.

Good, because I hate for, you know, do all this work and then you go to the Fish and Wildlife and they say no.

Yes. And they don't, I mean, just to clarify, they don't get to just say no. I mean, they provide, they can provide comments. I mean, and they can challenge it. They could appeal it if they wanted to or, you know, but yeah, it's not like where we need there.

So they don't have veto? No.

No, they don't have veto power, but we want to reflect it. I mean, part of the kind of one of the important components as cities are developing local regulations is that we do circulate it to state agencies because they do. I mean, they have a lot of expertise in these areas, but sometimes, and I think they'll admit this, they get hyper-focused on their areas of expertise and interest. Oh, yeah.

And don't communicate with other entities.

Yeah, and they don't care about anybody else. Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay, well then, I was going to ask, what would happen if we didn't do any, if we just kept the way it is? There must be some authority that says we have to make a change, right? Does that make sense?

I could see them if, say, we were staying at 50-foot and 100-foot buffers, that I could see probably a state agency, whether it's Ecology or Fish and Wildlife, challenging that themselves, like essentially appealing to this.

So the change is required because of the Growth Management Act. We are mandated to update our critical areas code and other development regulations periodically to keep up with the best available science.

And the best available science has been updated by Fish and Wildlife. And so if we don't, we're not. I see how it works. Okay.

But yes, I mean, we have to do a periodic, but this is essentially the equivalent of a comp plan periodic update is that we are required to do it. You know, and we're a little bit behind now, but we wanted to get it right. But yeah, I mean, if we just didn't adopt anything, we'd be completely out of compliance, but if we adopted something and it didn't reflect best available science, then I could see some of these agencies who are responsible for that best available science, very, forcefully expressing their disapproval.

Okay. Just wanted to check. Okay. The next thing is the buffer of the buffer, which is the 10-foot setback. I see that one of the changes is you're increasing the buffer on the buffer from 5 feet to 10 feet. And it gives rationale that there needs to be room for construction staging, maintenance, repair, primary buildings. There are many homes there will even accessory structures like like sheds and stuff that don't require a 10 foot buffer just to be able to make the structure. i've got a shed on my property line that's like maybe just two feet away and I didn't so. No, it's within regulations. I know it's within regulations. We can scrub that from the recording. But anyway, so I don't think the 10 feet is required. Why can't we keep it at five?

I mean, the 10 feet, yeah, is generally looking at other jurisdictions and looking at the guidance from state agencies that is kind of what they've reflected as the best available science is to having that additional 10-foot building set back from the edge of the buffer. I mean, we can look into that some more and see if other jurisdictions haven't done that. I just, I know that that has essentially become the norm.

Really? Okay. Because, yeah.

We haven't seen a norm in the buffer distances besides 100 and 150 feet. They vary throughout. cities that have adopted it or the counties. But we have seen the 10-foot building set back from the critical area. That's pretty much been the standard of what the jurisdictions have been going with.

Okay. Oh, and another one, it says accessory structures less than 200 feet may be set back 10 feet. Oh, yeah. So does that mean they don't have to do the 10 feet?

No, I think that just needs to be fit. The phrasing in there just needs to be updated. Let me look at that one.

This concept isn't new. I mean, going back to our adopted code, it does say buildings and other structures shall maintain the standard building setback. And I don't think we propose to change that language. And if there is no buffer, there is a minimum of 10 feet. If for some reason you have a critical area and there wasn't a buffer established for whatever reason, and you go to build something, you still have to have a minimum setback.

Okay.

And I don't think that language has changed.

It hasn't.

It's still 10 feet.

Yeah. And I mean, conceptually, uh, whether it's an NGPA tract, some other sort of critical area, whether it's some other sort of easement, we treat all of those the same as we do basically a property line. And so you need to have your 10 foot set back from that.

And with an accessory structure, what you're reading is that you don't have to do 10 feet. You can move it in from 10 feet to five feet.

Yeah. So the most, the most, it was five feet, but now it's 10 feet.

Well, the 10 feet is reflecting kind of the best available science, but Specifically for accessory structures, the most common situation is if, say, you're in the R4 zone, our lowest density zone, and it has a 20-foot rear yard setback, that normally from that setback you would need 10 feet. I mean, you would need 20 feet in the rear yard, but for these smaller accessory structures, you can go to 10 feet. So we're aligning kind of the critical area buffer setback to be the same essentially as a property line setback.

Okay. All right, well, I push back, but all right, whatever. I got one more thing, and I must be misunderstanding this, because this doesn't make sense to me, and that's the 1488-287. Permanent fencing and signage adjacent to a regulated wetland or stream corridor must or shall be required. So... Do we need to, and this is not even, this is like already in the existing chapter.

It is, yes.

So fences, so if someone has a home with the buffer and the stream, they have to build a fence between their home and the stream?

I can give you examples of why we require that because of situations where we annex properties from Snohomish County You have a private individual on a one-acre lot. They have a steep slope and a stream in the back. Well, they have a recorded CASP, a critical areas protection site plan, that's recorded at the county. Over the years, they have parked out the area. They've made private improvements. We get a call, a complaint from a neighbor, and this is a very common code enforcement situation where they have gone in, They've brought in, let's say, 30 cubic yards of fill. They filled in the slope, put in a retaining wall, expanded and built a deck. So because they'll say, I did not know I had a critical area buffer on my property. Even though they bought the property, it was in the title, it was recorded, it was there. Ignorance is bliss at times, but this is probably our most common code enforcement with critical areas, and it happens a lot. We have a lot of open cases right now. So having that delineation on the property with the signage saying, hey, do not go in here, don't mow, don't dump, don't build a porch or a patio or a fire pit, that's what really protects the critical areas buffer. So that's why it's so important, particularly on the individual areas. private properties it's probably the single most important mitigation measure i would it is it and it's common practice across the entire puget sound and so if we had a grant program to go back in to help property owners to put in signage and fencing that would probably be one of the huge environmental improvement we could have in the city.

So with the buffers moving, do people need to move their fences?

No, no, they, they're, they're vested. Yeah. They're vested. They won't be losing their property.

And most of those, when you have say a split rail fence, you know, you, you have a recorded native growth protection area or, you know, going back older critical area site plan, um, And that basically establishes the critical areas on your site and you're vested to that.

And I see on here that it needs to be a type of fence that lets wildlife through.

So it'll generally be a split rail fence with gaps about this big to allow things to get through.

That's most common, but we actually will allow even like a chain link fence in some cases if there is a reason that we want separation of wildlife from... You know, if we want to not get them to go, you know, across the roadway or something and funnel them, you know, sort of through a habitat corridor. So there might be times that the fencing may vary and be something like chain link.

And are gaps allowed in the fence so people can actually go to the stream? Are you kidding me? So people aren't allowed to go into the critical area and enjoy it. There's no prohibition for people going into.

You can walk in. People do walk in, but you don't want to park it out or make it your yard.

Well, again, there are certain allowed activities that are within 1488.

Trail buffer.

As far as like certain types of trails and things. So, yeah, you would be able to go in if you say had an allowed activity that, you know, If you're just wanting to walk back in there. Yeah, that's, that's not an issue. It's if you're doing any actual development activity or maintenance or any of that. That's where the issue is. You can walk around back there, but You have to climb over your fence. If you're mowing it. Well, and that's, I mean, that's with us typical You can just kind of get through them. They're like three feet, but

i'm sorry getting it yeah it's just this is just so if you see a new development where there's a critical area steep slope in the backyard you will see the fencing or or the end and the ngpa signage in the newer developments yeah the older ones you typically won't see them because they've either been removed or they were never installed i guess that was where my mind kept going and reading through this is this is all

built towards new development, which we're going to have less and less of, but it's the people that actually live here and are invested here that are going to, to Commissioner Dewar's point, there's going to be a lot of people that this impacts. So that's why I want it to be fully vetted.

Well, and that's why we wanted to bring it back several times and why we wanted to make sure to share the functionally disconnected buffer language, because that is an incredibly important component within the developed portions of our city that we have very clear language that if you have an already developed site that, you know, the critical areas code is not going to be applied in the same way it is for a brand new greenfield development. I mean, if you have a totally blank site with critical areas running through the middle, yeah, you're going to have some issues developing that site. If you have an infill site that's already completely paved, you don't really have any buffer function, so there's no point of trying to administer the code the same way.

And Christy Schmidt, Planning Manager, and to your points, Commissioner Morton, those are excellent questions that likely those are ones that will be reflected on an FAQ when we go out with draft for public comment, because those are the questions of the homeowners. Those are the ones that they're going to want to

want to know how does it impact me in my yard if you were to publish that that map to the city's website and for people to look at that that people their hair is going to go on fire because they're going to want to wait a second what am i going to because remember last year there were people coming in here they were worried that their homes were going to get torn down and and people yeah definitely need to be educated and and told uh and very simple words yes not yeah no and we you know for that for those reasons we did come up with an faq and

It maybe didn't get circulated as widely as it needed to be because there were definitely some people that didn't see that. And once we did have to have a lot of one-on-one conversations and walk them through. And once we actually could explain it to them, they're like, oh, okay, I get that. Like that they thought that some of these things were mandatory, that we were going to make them.

Yeah.

you know, we were rezoning you to multifamily residential, so you have to tear down your house and build multifamily residential. It's like, no, that's not really the way that it works.

But, I mean, bringing it back to reality here, and that was an awful example of some miscommunication. But when it comes to seeing all of the development that's going on just off Machias, South Lake Steve, everything that's going on in the city, And then you're going to be told that you own property and all of a sudden you can't develop it. You know what I mean? Whether you've just bought it or you've been there for 30 years, that's going to be a different conversation. I mean, the example that you just posed was rumor gone run amok. This is real. And I think that there's going to be a different level, perhaps, of discontent when it comes to this, when it comes out.

So, yeah, I think we can try to create some graphics. We typically don't like to use specific properties in the city just because then people get so fixated on that. but just create like a hypothetical site plan of like you have an existing driveway that splits your property in half and you have a critical area on the west side and you want to develop on the east side, you're still going to be able to develop on the east side because that whole eastern portion is disconnected from the stream on the west side because you have this big concrete or asphalt driveway that runs right through the middle and it's completely eliminated buffer function on the east side. So we can kind of do some things like that. That doesn't mean that somebody that's not in that situation that has a largely undeveloped site isn't going to be like, oh, man, you're bumping me up from 50 to 100. That's going to gobble up my whole property. And then, yeah, that's a little bit of a harder discussion. Right.

So just to sort of maybe wrap things up tonight, you've seen the large technical changes. As you've already heard, we need to do a little bit more research and analysis and pull everything together, I think. from a thousand foot level. I think we're very comfortable with the analysis where we're going, that we need to complete that work. And then that'll be reflected in the mapping that Jill does. And there'll be another set of mapping that won't be as scary where you'll have the purple then the red and then we'll do something else where actually the fully developed areas will be taken out of that equation so there's the hypotheticals and then this is reality and what does this really look like to hopefully come up with that number uh some of the changes that aren't reflected but these are right in line with what you're saying commissioner morton Dave and I have already talked about going back through the entire document again and really trying to add a lot of plain speak, really want to activate the voice and condense redundant sections that are sprinkled throughout there. So that's going to be another goal that you'll see in the final draft is to really hone it in and make it As digestible as possible as possible. It's still going to be a thick legal document, but there will be some other types of changes that we're proposing to do. And so that's really the remainder of our work and we got to finish our analysis. We have to finish our mapping and then do cleanups of the entire chapter. And then we didn't hear a lot from Commissioner Davis tonight. So maybe just invite her if she has any sort of closing comments on online and then hand it back to Dave if he has any final comments for the good of the group.

Uh, you know what my questions were actually asked. So I appreciate the input from the other commissioners. And I am comfortable with where we're at moving and looking forward to the next time we see it.

All right, great. Yeah, I don't have that was basically that those are the major items and rest actually did a pretty much word for word kind of wrap up of what I was gonna have on the last slide. So I think we're good. Um, and, uh, yeah, I appreciate the feedback. Um, yeah, it's been a bit of a slog, but I think we're in a good place and, um, yeah, just appreciate the discussion tonight. So thank you.

Thank you for that explanation. And thank you for your patience with my questions. Um, so, uh, Connor commissioner Davis is, um, uh, is not. here and uh and i would what's the process for unexcused you don't need to take any okay action just the minutes will reflect that he was absent tonight and got excused great all right let's move on to commissioner's report uh commissioner jennifer davis do you have anything to uh report uh nothing for me tonight thanks commissioner huxford

I have two things to report, both happy stories. I don't often do happy stories. My husband and I awarded our scholarship to our Lake Stevens High School grad. It is our skilled trades scholarship. We were honored to be able to do that and are hopeful that it's helpful in her future plans. I also was there when the Cronin family awarded their scholarships. They can never choose one, so this year they chose four recipients. They are very, very generous. And wanted to, with his permission, let you know that past Commissioner Cronin and his wife have a new baby girl. John's a dad. That's all.

No report tonight. And I have nothing. So Director Wright.

Okay. So as you can see, the museum is going vertical. So we are super excited about that. City Hall project has gone out for bid, and we will be awarding bids sometime in July. So that project is also moving forward. Those are a couple of my big updates. And we continue to slog through a huge volume of permits this first half of the year, 10 school projects, some very large residential projects, subdivisions, apartments, as well as other civic projects. building. So on that side of the team, they've been extremely busy. And we're trying to keep our long range program afloat. So you'll be seeing the updates to the sub area plan at your next meeting. I believe planning manager Schmidt wanted to talk to you a little bit about your availability for the summer. So we can do that right now and then plan out accordingly. And then after she does that, if you have any questions for me, I'm happy to address any questions.

We do. If you pull up your calendars, who is available for the first meeting in July? And we'll start there. That would be July 1st. It is. I know it's right before the holiday weekend.

I look okay.

You look okay.

Yeah. I'm available.

Okay, so all three of you. And Jennifer?

I am not.

Okay. So potentially we have three. Yeah, and we can poll everybody else. So you will probably get a redundant email for us for that one. And then let's take a look at the third meeting, which I think is the 17th, 15th.

That looks good. Yes, I'm available.

Okay.

We got to our Morton. yeah you're available to okay Jennifer Davis.

Unfortunately, July is terrible for me but i'm back at it hitting it hard in August and September.

That conversation okay.

Well, the two items we were looking at bringing forth to you in July was the first sub areas, and that would be our senior planner, Troy Davis. He'd be bringing that back to you with edits. And then in addition, we were just going to give you a briefing on the changes proposed to Title V. Only changes to Title XIV are really required to go to Planning Commission. However, we felt since it is a citywide issue, it's a proposed ban for roosters within the city, along with a change in pet licensing. And that is being really proposed by code enforcement and also our police department, our community service officer. based on the needs of the community and complaints that they've seen. So we just wanted to provide you a brief and a small written update at your next meeting on that. And that would be going to the city council. Do we need two meetings to do both of those things? Can we do one meeting in July and cover both? Yes, I do. Because I think the debriefing, it'd be short. It's only going to be about 15 minutes, maybe less. And depending on your questions and then the sub areas, I'm guessing it will be probably 40 minute conversation.

So can we do one or the other is my point? Can we do the first or the 15th?

Yes, we can do one. We'll take the poll and see who the most commissioners are available on that date, and we will go with that one. So you have a little summer free time.

Good.

And then also another matter at our department, we are receiving another intern. She will be starting on Monday, the 22nd. So she will be coming to a planning commission meeting and probably doing a presentation before you just like last year. So we have another great qualified candidate as do all the other departments.

Oh, and speaking of candidates, do we have an effort yet to fill the opening?

Yes, there have been two applicants. It's been a matter of the clerks trying to get everyone scheduled to get in the same room to do the interviews. Okay.

Great. Well, with that, I think that we are ready for an ending and adjourning. So do we have a motion to adjourn? Moved. Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. All right. We are adjourned.