General Legislative Session - public_hearing

Snohomish County Council is called to order for our public hearings. Today is Wednesday, July 22nd, 2026 at 1030 a.m. We're meeting in the Jackson boardroom and also remotely. I will read the script for providing public testimony and then we will take roll. So we'll take public testimony on each agenda item. Public testimony will begin with in-person and then remotely. On Zoom, click on the hand icon to raise your hand. If you're calling in by phone, press star nine to raise your hand and star six to unmute. Each speaker will have three minutes to speak, and please start your testimony with your name and city of residence. Next is roll call.

Chair Dunn. Here. Vice Chair Lowe.

Present.

Council Member Neering.

Here.

Council Member Mead. Council Member Peterson.

Here.

Chair, we have four members present.

Thank you. We have one action item today. It's Ordinance 26-020. Good morning. Sorry. You're okay.

Council considers ordinance 26-020 relating to growth management concerning setbacks amending Snohomish County Code.

Good morning, Chair Dunn and Council Members. For the record, Deb Bell, Council Staff. Proposed ordinance 26-020 was first introduced at the June 16th Planning and Community Development Committee with time and date for public hearing set at the June 24th GLS. The proposed ordinance would amend and update the setbacks tables, the road networks elements, and covered parking structures. with the goal to simplify regulations. PDS staff is here to give Council an updated and corrected slideshow overview. The requested action today is to take public comment before taking action on the ordinance, and this concludes my staff report, and I'm available for any questions along with PDS staff.

Hi, Council. For the record, Michael Sapunaro, Long Range Planning. You may remember this. I gave a presentation concerning setbacks on the June 16th meeting, and in that PowerPoint, there were just two slides that need to be slightly corrected because they had an obsolete table that was shown and also just an obsolete footnote. And so if I may, I just want to show a quick PowerPoint just to clear the record and just show an updated table and footnote that should have been shown in the June 16th PowerPoint just to correct the record. Okay, so just a enter the record corrections to the PowerPoint presentation that planning development committee on 616 26 concerning setbacks. There are just two corrections. I wanted to correct on the record on the presentation for the ordinance 26020 The slides contain a footnote and a table screenshot from a presentation. Way back from July 22 2025 that have since been modified and don't reflect the content of the proposed ordinance. And it was on slides five and nine, the footnote 30, 23, 49, 16, as an obsolete description of public roads. And slides seven and eight, the screenshot of table 30, 23, 48, minimum setbacks for entrances to cover parking structures from road network elements as an obsolete table design, inaccurate column heading, referencing the phrase land division, which was seen as unclear. So to correct the record, I'll just give a quick little heads up. Let me see if I can change the slider here.

Do you think you can move that forward, Lisa, for me?

Thank you. Correction one, the obsolete slide, it had public roads, includes public right-of-ways, both opened and unopened, which was a little unclear language, and it's supposed to say 30, 23, 49, public road includes all roads and highways maintained by local, state, or federal government entities for the passage of vehicles. And just as a reminder of why that matters, just kind of a weird loophole when it comes to setbacks where the definition of public roads used to have a definition that said maintained by the county, But then when people would say, well, it's a state highway, so does a setback apply to a public road if a public road is only maintained by the county? So it's kind of a weird loophole. That's why the language was updated like that, just for reference. There was just a kind of obsolete table that was shown, and it has to do with the amount of asterisks in the table. It just needs a lot of rows to show, well, here are the setback distances. And the funny thing is a lot of the setback distances, they're kind of all the same for a lot of the cells, but you need the asterisks in certain zones because it has to do with certain qualifiers for the setbacks for certain zones. So that's why there's so many rows, even if they have the same number, just to be able to put certain footnotes. So we wanted to make the tables clear and easy and small, short to read, but then it's also a weird complexity where you also have to have the granular detail for each row for each, uh, asterisk. So that's, that's kind of the long and short of why that table is like that. And, uh, There was just for a closer view for people who are seeing the record. That's why the table rows are like that. And I think that is just the long and short of it. So those were the corrections made to the PowerPoint done last month. Any questions?

Questions from council? Okay. Did that conclude your report?

That concludes my report.

Okay. Okay. If there's no questions, we will open up public testimony on ordinance 26-020. Did anyone wish to provide public comment? There's no one in the room. Are there any hands raised? No hands raised. Okay. So seeing none, then we will close public testimony on this item and turn to council.

I move approval of ordinance 26-020. Second.

It's been properly moved and seconded to approve ordinance 26-020. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, we'll have a roll call vote.

Vice Chair Lowe?

Yes.

Council Member Nehring?

Yes.

Council Member Peterson? Aye. Chair Dunn? Yes.

And then, did Council Member Reed join us? Okay, so that passes 4-0. So that concludes our agenda, and Council is adjourned for the day.