Legislative Meeting - Regular Meeting

Welcome everybody. It is September 29th, 2026. It is our two o'clock commissioner consent agenda meeting. Let the record reflect that all five commissioners are present. There was no written comment received for items on today's agenda. And so we do have about... 12 or 13 people signed up. So we will just, on public comment, we'll limit it to two minutes for everyone. And we'll go ahead and stand for the pledge.

Okay, so I'm gonna open public forum and we're gonna start with the people online. So if you would, I'm gonna, Ron, if you can let me know who. Yes, okay Brittany, we'll start with you and we're limited to two minutes.

Thanks. Thank you. Your two minutes is up. Lon Otison? You have two minutes.

Thank you. There's one last person online and then we'll go to the people that are here in the audience. Terry Otteson, you have two minutes.

Okay. Next, Josh, I'm going to have you help me just for timing.

All right. John Hancock, Howard Hasler. Heasley and then Spencer Lambden.

Nope. Yes. So then we'll wait until that is item 8D and we will add that to our listed. Thank you. Next is Spencer Lambden.

Debbie Novak, Emily Eck, and Patricia Vadon.

And I'll just say, Patricia is scheduled to speak regarding the proclamation, so she is not coming up at open public forum. Thank you.

Elizabeth Melville, followed by Jim Lighty, followed by Terry Horn.

And then following Terry, just to round out the lineup, is Jeremiah Harding and then Mark Hendren.

So I will say our next, we have a scheduled public hearing for our budget that is now set up for October 20th at 5.30. So we are having an evening meeting. Right. Right here? And that's on our budget discussions.

OK, so that ends our public hearing, our open public forum at this point in time. And so then I'm going to look to item 3A, which is a proclamation. The proclamation is October 2026 as National Disability Employment Awareness Month in Spokane County, Washington. And I will look to my fellow commissioner.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm going to read this proclamation in the form of a motion. in the matter of proclaiming October 2026 as National Disability Employment Awareness Month in Spokane County, Washington, whereas October 2026 marks the 81st anniversary of National Disability Employment Awareness Month, and whereas workplaces that welcome the talents of all people, including those with disabilities, are a critical part of our efforts to build an inclusive community and a strong economy. whereas activities during this month will reinforce the skills that people with disabilities have to offer

MOTION IS SECOND FOR THE PROCLAMATION THAT WAS JUST READ. ANY FURTHER DISCUSSION? All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion passes unanimously. Justin, I'm not sure who's coming up to speak. We'll have you speak to the topic and then we'll hand you the resolution.

Thank you. If you guys would all like to come up and we'll take a picture with you and pass the proclamation on. Okay, so for the rest of the agenda through, except for item eight and nine, I will look to my fellow commissioners.

Madam Chair, move to approve items four, five, six, and seven, including all sub-items on today's agenda. Second.

I have a motion and a second for items four, five, and six, six, and seven, and all sub-items. Any further comments? Commissioner French?

Yes, Madam Chair, thank you. I just want to point out that we have a number of grants that we've received from the County Road Administration Board. I sit on that board representing counties in the state of Washington, and this is a program that we set up a number of years ago, and a local road improvement program And it was set up because there are funding mechanisms to deal with state roads and county-wide roads, but local roads went wanting, and it was up to the local jurisdictions to be able to fund and improve those projects and stuff and so we set up a local road improvement fund program

Thank you. Any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion passes unanimously. Okay, that is going to take us to item 8A. We'll start with 8A, to consider vacation of a portion of Keeney Road. County Engineers Road File Number 345S for this booking, County Public Works Department. And Matt Zarek, are we going to listen to you for a few items?

see any questions from the board so thank you very much this is a open this is a public hearing item for this item so if there's anyone wishing to testify please come forward now second call third and fight yes and it's so just it's speaking to this road vacation

Third and final call for anyone wishing to testify on item number 8A. Is there no one online? No one else in the audience? I will close the public testimony on item 8A and look to my fellow commissioners.

Madam Chair, I move to approve public hearing item number 8A in the matter of vacation of a portion of King Road County Engineers Road File number 345S for the Spokane County Public Works Department.

Okay, I have a motion and a second. Is there any further discussion on this item? seeing none all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye motion passes unanimously that will then take us to item eight b which is to consider vacation of a portion of lyons avenue in the platte clearview county road county engineers road file number 2416 for the Spokane County Public Works Department. And Matt Zaricor.

And just to clarify, the landowners are requesting next year?

Thank you. Any other questions for Matt? Seeing none. This is a public hearing item, so we'll open it up for public testimony on item A to B. First call for anyone wanting to testify. Seeing no one online, no one in the audience. Second call. Seeing no one online and no one in the audience, I will, third and final call. Seeing no one, I will close the public testimony and look to my fellow commissioners.

Madam Chair, move to approve public hearing item number 8B and accept the county engineer's recommendation for the vacation of a portion of Lyons Avenue in the Platte Clearwater County Engineer Road file number 2416 for Spokane County Public Works Department. Second.

Okay, I have a motion. Second. Is there any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Motion passes unanimously. That then takes us to item 8C, which is to consider vacation of a portion of Martin Road and a portion of Mose Road. County Engineers Road file numbers 3010 and 3220 for the Spokane County Public Works Department and Matt Zaricor.

Are there any questions for Mr. Zarikori? Seeing none, thank you. This is a public hearing item, so I'll open up public testimony for item 8C. Sure.

Thank you. Is there anyone else in the public or online that would like to speak to item 38C? Seeing no one else, this is third and final call for 8C. Seeing no one else, I will close the public testimony on 8C and look to my fellow commissioners.

Matt, if I could ask a couple of questions. Matt, can you walk us through vacations and why the county would ever engage in vacating right-of-way?

previous right-of-ways that we've adopted are that we have vacated our situations many times where it will bisect or split a property in half and if that is the case a landowner is not able to build across that right-of-way correct that's correct and so so in many times it is a landowner asking for us to vacate a piece of property so they can develop their property and in what way they see fit. In many cases like this, it could be a barn, it could be an outbuilding, maybe a pool, something like that that they want to build on their property and they would need us to vacate for them to have tha

I've already closed a public hearing on 8C. Ma'am?

Sometimes it's that simple. Madam Chair, Madam Chair, I move to approve item 8C and accept the county engineer's recommendation and vacate of, in the vacation of a portion of Martin Road and a portion of Moe's Road, County Engineer Road filed number 3010 and 3320 for the Spokane County Public Works Department. Second. Second.

Okay, my motion is second. Is there any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion passes unanimously. That will then take us to item number 8D, is in the matter of creating the affordable housing permit program for expedited review and fee deferrals and adopting a new section 3.08.080 of the Spokane County Code. I think Jordan Neal you're gonna be speaking to this Thank you Thank You madam chair Pull up the presentation real quick

Okay. Okay, any questions? Commissioner Walder.

And just to remind everyone, what are we defining as affordable housing for this? Is it the 80% or under of the median income?

Okay, so it would follow like the similar guidelines of the state or the federal government.

So I just wanted to say thank you for all of your work in this area and your efforts to make affordable housing, which is one of our goals, more achievable. for members of the community. I also want to thank my fellow commissioner, Ms. Waldruff, for her efforts in terms of pursuing this. This clearly was a joint effort to achieve a common goal, which is how do we provide more affordable housing for folks in the county and stuff. So I just wanted to say thank you for your work, and thank you to my fellow commissioner.

Thank you, Commissioner French. Commissioner French did bring up this deferral idea months ago, and I didn't want to let it go, so we worked together. I did want to toot our horn, though, here at the county, that in your slide where you compared us to the city and some other jurisdictions with what we do to try and incentivize and support affordable housing. In this process, we also... We also here at the county defer general facility fees or GFCs if those are collected for a particular project until the occupancy, certificate of occupancy or some other criteria. And I don't believe the city d

Okay, thank you. Okay, this is a public hearing item, so I'll open up the public testimony for item number 8D, and I do have two people that have signed up to speak. The first one is Howard Ainsler. No worries.

Thank you. Is there anyone else that would like to testify on item number 8D? Terry Horn.

Second call for anyone wishing to testify.

Thank you. This is the third and final call for anyone wishing to testify. I see no one online and no one else in the audience. I will close the public testimony and look to my fellow commissioners.

Madam Chair, I move that we approve public hearing item number 8D in the matter of creating the affordable housing permit program for expedited review and fee deferrals and adopting a new section 3.08.080 for the Spokane County Code. Second.

Motion is second. Any further discussion? Commissioner Jordan.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to join in the positive feelings bandwagon up here. I think this is a positive, good step today. It's common sense. I wanted to thank Commissioners French and Waldriff for their work on it. I know there have been numerous meetings, drafts, presentations, so I think this is a good step forward. As we all know, affordable housing is an important goal for the county as well as in the comprehensive plan, and we want to do whatever we can to increase the ability of people to afford housing at a variety of income levels. I would also encourage us to keep going a

I would just say before we vote, thank you to Commissioner Waldrop and Commissioner French. I think it is great that you guys worked together to make this happen, and so I'm happy to support it. So all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion passes unanimously. That takes us to the end of the items on our agenda. Any miscellaneous matters? I know Mr. Chesney, you have a miscellaneous matter that just came before us today.

Were you asking me? No, I think this is a conversation that can be with yourself, Mr. McMorris, and the commissioners. I don't know that there's any other staff that needs to be part of it.

Okay. So we're going to go into executive session for approximately 20 minutes based on what our attorney just stated. Okay. So the people that will be in it, at the end of that 20 minutes, we will be adjourning for the day as we will have no other business coming before us. So we will close the meeting and go into executive session. It will probably take five minutes to get into executive session. So we will start at 3.30. Thank you all for being here.