Editor,
Clark County Citizens United, Inc. (CCCU) opposes the Cluster Ordinance and Alternative 2, discussed in a recent Reflector article.
The affected parcels are smaller than the proposed zones and the cluster is based on the zone density. It is well documented that all resource land in Clark County was determined via an aerial photo and staff interpretation. Land with trees was zoned forest and land without trees was zoned agriculture.
The Western Washington Growth Management Hearing Board’s illegal activities lost in court, but the county ignored the court orders. Commissioners kept promising CCCU that corrections would be made, after the urban areas were complete. That never happened.
The old agriculture-forest was just a diversion, while the county zoned thousands of acres into a resource zone and lumped those appeals with the agriculture-forest appeal. This prevented landowners from their day in court.
Before 1994, most of that land was zoned 2.5 and 5 acres. Nan Hendrickson, of Camas, was on the Hearing Board at the time. The court said the county used an illegal unauthorized formula in the rural lands, and had an illegal end in sight. It was a well contrived plan, but, the county failed to follow the GMA law, by not using the Natural Resources Conservation Services soils manual for prime soil, even though they said they did. Staff is doing the same thing all over again in the 2016 Plan, and much more.
The manipulated planning assumptions said Office of Financial Management population projection numbers had enough land, according to law. But the mark was missed. When correct assumptions were used, it was discovered the county is only planning for half of what is required by law.
Clark County Councilor David Madore discovered this deception in his research and county staff does not want the public to know or understand any of this information.
Community Planning Director Oliver Orjiako said the county is using Alternative 2 clusters to comply with state law, but that is not true. The county does have to follow the GMA state law when creating the 2016 Comprehensive Plan.
But, there is no law saying what that must look like. The majority of the counties in the state have the same rural and resource zoning as was proposed in the Alternative 4 option. One county doesn’t have resource zones at all, because they don’t have prime soil. The other counties were researched very carefully, before Alternative 4 was proposed.
All of their designations passed muster at the Hearing Board level and in the courts. In many instances, the courts gave even more, and that is what happened in CCCU’s 1995 through 1999 court cases.
Clustering is and has always been a GMA allowed option, but Clark County is using it as a mandatory large lot zone. Many red flags are in the Alternative 2 proposal and the devil is in the details. But, it gives an idea as to what the county is not telling the people.
Clustering requires design standards, building envelopes, scenic view preservation, 85 percent remainder lot covenants, special water requirements, homes next to the road, and much more. Planning staff is good at making the proposal look warm and fuzzy, while seeming to believe that rural people are too dumb to figure it out. To accomplish that, the county limits the right information, given at the right time.
The Reflector has had very informative articles about the Comprehensive Plan and we hope you will continue. Former Publisher and EditorMarvin Case was good at getting important information out to the people in a timely fashion and people came to the hearings in the hundreds to protest the 1994 plan.
Staff finally admits they want the land preserved for the cities and refuse to honor the court orders and constitutional property rights. Planning staff is not concerned about preserving the resource, they just want the land. The whole process was and is illegal.
Clark County Citizens United, Inc. will have to go back in court to prove it.
Carol Levanen
Executive Secretary, Clark County Citizens United
Battle Ground
