Hm. Oh, yeah.
Recording in progress.
Just waiting for the clock tower
by the bell. That's right. I'm over, I'm trying K one. Yeah. There you go.
Recording it.
Here we go. Anybody's a vuf
breaking the passivity.
Yeah,
good morning, everyone. I'll call this meeting with the Jefferson County Board of
Commissioners to order. Um I, I wanna acknowledge um and, and thank our law enforcement
team who dealt with a very, very difficult issue this weekend, uh death of a newborn.
Um I can't imagine what they have to face and it's affecting the community at large.
Um But really deep respect for those who, who have to respond to situations like
that. And um uh you know, to get, it gives pause to a number of us thinking, you
know, you know, it is, is the system working when, when something like that can happen.
So I feel deep, deep sadness. Um Anything else this morning before we
get started? No. Right. Uh We will start this morning with public comments as we
always do in an effort to make sure that everyone has equal opportunity to speak.
We do keep public comments to three minutes apiece. There is a timer when the green
light is on. Um You have plenty of time when the yellow light comes on. That means
you have 30 seconds left. And when the red light comes on, we ask you to stop speaking
again. This is for fairness so that everyone has the same amount of time to speak.
We ask that you please um abide by the time limit and we will um ask people to stop
speaking um at, at the three minute mark, one more thing. Um We respond to all the
comments after we get the comments. If you want to establish dialogue, it's great
to stick around and listen to our response too. But we do listen to everyone to before
we respond. Very good. Thank you. Um And uh it is helpful if you state your name
um and your uh area of residence, but it is not required. So we'll start with folks
in the room who would like to provide public comment this morning.
Welcome.
And it's helpful if you speak right into the microphone. So we and everyone online
can hear you. Yeah. My name is Sby and Pone Hill
77 years ago. And I came back, I got married at 21 and
I came back 50 years ago and I got lost and I was
living in the island and the cold front back home by
Angel. They came over and put me in a hotel because it was cold out. And I'm living
in a, um, a van
and, and his daughter went out, I had a park that, uh, back the safeway where the
bus stations are and trying to get the start on. Now I end up in the hospital
because it was so cold. It was like 7, 16 degrees. And the policeman came, all,
came over and move to tow it away and the friends of mine to them and they got a
station on it did not tow it away. This is during the cold, right? And 11 place
that we can't tow it because of the cold front. Well, the next couple of days after
that they told him. So I'm, I'm living and straight and I
did and some people say that, uh, some, they are just dishonest. I just want my
band back.
Thank you. And we will respond to everyone's comment when we're done. Is it Holmes
V? Is that your last name? Fol MS V? Thank you. I'm just
scared to death that they're gonna not give him a van back
and I pray that God it's in God's hands. So he's telling me it'll be ok. But I'm,
I still lose faith or become human. Oh, thank you. Yeah. Ok.
And we will, we will respond to it at the end of the, I just can't believe a place
being dishonest. I just, I guess they are. Thank you. Yeah. Mhm.
Right. I'm Maggie. I was at the Warming Center. I have direct knowledge that the
police lied to Harold. Um, because I was on the phone with the Governor Jay Inslee
telling him that they were gonna tow his vehicle while it was snowing. And then they
came in and they said, well, we're not gonna tow your vehicle and he went to check
on it and they towed it anyway. And he came back and he told me in the Warming center
where he was staying during the emergency declaration that they towed it anymore,
even though they personally came to the warming center and said they were not going
to tow it. And also, I am really uh ashamed that you guys,
the police department decided during the emergency declaration to go around and tow
vehicles and give, uh you know, without competitive spending caps, they could offer
more money to the tow truck drivers. So, you know, they were just having a free for
all going around and towing people's homeless people's vehicles. And uh meanwhile
there was a baby in danger and it just seems like they got their priorities exactly
wrong when they should have been looking for baby dough. They were saying, whoopee,
let's tow all these vehicles at three times the price because whoopee, that's cronyism,
whoopee, that's nepotism. Whoopee, that's capitalism and who cares about a baby in
peril? Thank you.
Who else would like to provide public comment this morning? Anyone else in the room
does nothing come out.
Good morning commissioners. Uh Mr mcauley, Miss Galloway. Uh I think the Warming
Center did save lives. I'm really proud of what we did there as a community. Uh There's
been a lot of talk lately about swimming pools and I think that the Jefferson County
does need a public swimming pool. I don't pretend to know how to make that happen,
how to keep one, but I want to thank the commissioners for the way you've taken up
this issue. Uh To me, swimming is an essential life skill. I grew up going to public
pools. Uh The kids I grew up with went swimming a lot, boy scouts. We were required
to learn to swim 100 yards just to get our first class badge. Uh We went to the pool
for fun and for sport. Um imagine coming back to school in the fall and greeting
a classmate who had won an Olympic medal. It was bronze, but still it was, it was
a big deal. Uh As a teacher here, I took my whole class to the pool every year
so they could learn to swim several times a year. Thousands of kids in Jefferson
County learn to swim in the public pool. It was built with public money over 60 years
ago, at least twice. Uh the Port Town school district that reaches down to Discovery
Bay voted in funding measures to renovate it. I believe it's time to build something
better. Something new and something that can last. It will serve families, Children,
seniors and visitors for decades to come. Uh, I haven't gone swimming in a long time.
I don't expect to anytime soon, but I don't mind paying for it. I think it's that
important. The health here together, steering committee was convened by the city
but it did include officials of the county, the port, a school district, the hospital,
all of them representing interests of people who live outside the city. I have every
confidence in the integrity of their work and their good hearts in taking it up.
I don't think I've ever seen a government decision that everyone thought was perfectly
managed or that everyone agreed with. It's not easy to create something for the greater
good, especially in this political climate, but having a public swimming necessity,
I hope that we can come together as a community for the good of the community if
r still and Columbia County can do it. So can we thank you? Thank you, Mister Kelly
P. Anyone else in the room which to provide public comments, MS Peterson and then
uh the man in the back. Good morning, good morning. Um Deborah Peterson. I live in
Port Townsend and I have another issue related to the aquatic center. Um It has to
do with something on your uh consent agenda today which is approval of the agreement
with the Department of Commerce. Um And I hope you can pull it and discuss this.
Uh the appendix to the agreement in describing the scope of work says
that it will be about building a multi-purpose recreation facility, including among
other things, a pool, locker room and other amenities. This does not specifically
mention public showers which this body and the city specifically asked for.
And um I don't, you know, this language is not exclusive but it is not inclusive
either. Um And if we're going to pay somebody to do a, a study of this, it should
include everything that is um hope for. Um otherwise I
might have to go back to the drawing board if the PFD decides that's important. Um
Mr mccauley would be responsible for providing the um consultant with the all the
information that will presumably include the final report of the steering committee.
That report was distinctly tepid about public bathrooms. It mentioned that there
had been public support for them mentioned that they could be included that they
were thinking of external um entry and they considered that it might cost $100,000.
I'd like to know, you know what, but an actual analysis of that might be. Um
So I'm just, I'm just hoping that this can be included or that Mr mcauley can be
instructed to make sure that that is part of the information that they're given.
It's in the minutes, it's in the recordings of City council, it's in the recordings
of meetings of this body. So, um, thank you for that. Ok.
Their hand in the back there, sir. Hm. Make them.
Hi. My name is Zachary and I have family in protein. I've been living here for a
little bit. I am now staying at the homeless shelter here and, and
full scene. There's a lot of, in like rural areas out there, there's a lot of property
being bought out and people using them as Air BN Bs in places where they do not wanna
stay for retirement and stuff. And it's just sitting there most of the time and it's
just like not being used as what people in King would like it to be used as, and
people wanting to put things there and expand is as us as a community coming together
is not what we want. And, um, my father used to manager at the community center there
and, um about the whole thing and everything. If that goes through and all that,
we have came together as a community. That is something that we do not want to have
to put any type of money into. We do not want to have to pay any port towns and full
tax or anything and that we shouldn't have to be involved in something that as a
community, we don't one to have to put money into with the rise of property taxes
and everything else going up in our community there along with, along with the surrounding
communities. Too.
Thank you, Zachary.
Uh My name is Ariel Schulter. Um I am also a house uh in Port Townsend
right now. Um I'm not staying at the homeless shelter. Um uh but I have stayed there
before. Um, one of the policies at the homeless shelter is that you cannot use uh
the physical location there as an address um for variety of reasons. Um
This uh came up um for a couple of times, one was there, there
was like a group that was giving away um tablets and devices uh for people to use
to be able to keep in touch with family or apply for jobs or other types of things
that people use mobile devices for. Um But you need to be able to have an address
in their process of giving away the devices. Um
I think specifically a residential address. Um And so as they were talking with people
and um
around town, we're trying to like, you know, what are some ways we can, you know,
try and help people figure out um how to still connect people with this so they can
uh they need to do. The other thing that to me came up um was voter registration.
Uh I came down and talked to the uh the county auditor and I tried to be very thorough.
I explained my situation and the policy about using the address. Um and they seem
to understand and I tried to come back and double check to make sure that my voter
registration would come general delivery. Um The library in town is able to send,
they sent me a library card, general delivery. Um Some of the other uh uh government
organizations have sent uh mail to me general delivery. Apple Health has as well.
Um However, there was some sort of mix up and I did not receive my ballots, but I
did receive my voter registration card. Um So I was able to change my voter registration
to this county uh from Kissack, which is where I was living before. Uh There are
not, there's not a homeless shelter uh where I was living in Bainbridge Island. Um
And I moved here last February, it was icy. Um There was not uh facilities available,
this was the closest. Um And so I was really grateful there's been um I think you
all came down and we were able to see the emergency shelter. Uh And that was, I mean,
it was really great. Um And so I am really grateful to, you know, the, the services
that have been available in Jefferson County. Uh And I just wanted to let you know
um the staff at the auditor's office has been incredibly helpful. It was just the
one little thing I was able to get my voter registration card. I just didn't end
up receiving my ballot. Thank you.
Yeah. Yeah, I mean, what else in the room can I um because I didn't use my
time to reclaim the time that I'm sorry, we just do 11 comment per person again trying
to be fair to give everyone equal time. Um All right. Um We have a couple of folks
on Zoom. There was another hand in the room too. Oh, all right. Let's go to Zoom
and then I'll come back to the room. Um Let's do uh Janet Welch then Marilyn Show
Walter and Mr Tisch.
Hi. Can you hear me? Yes. Uh, my name is Janet Welch and I'm in Northland and I'm
sorry about my new dog here being pest. Um, I'd like to speak briefly about the shoreline
management, um, plan that you're gonna be, uh, looking at a revision on and speaking
specifically on section 440, subset three, um, which deals with some of the changes
in the gui duck, um, aquaculture regulations and specifically what I would, um, advocate
is to go back to what the draft had been up until a few months ago. A couple of months
ago when, um, it was changed to, um, kind of, to me make the situation a lot
more complex in that, um, discretionary conditional use permits are required in some
situations and regular conditional use permits are required in others and, and I
think it would be a lot better to just go back to standard conditional use permits,
um, for all of the new, expanded and converted. Um, categories of them. Um, I
understand the reason for discretionary conditional use. And, um, and I don't think
that aquaculture is a place where, you know, it's kind of like, uh, well, this really
doesn't really warrant conditional use, which is kind of how the discretionary is,
is used. So I would recommend in your, in your uh, review of that draft that you
go back to an earlier form where it was conditional use on on all of those activities.
And again, thank you so much for your service. You guys are doing a great job. Thank
you, M Mr Walker.
Can you hear me? Yes. Uh Yes. Um I agree with the previous speaker uh but I want
to cover three points that uh came up at your last week's workshop. The first is
the status of Mason County's regulation of gooey ducks. Despite what you have heard
or read, only conversions in Mason County can avoid the cup and I I'm
going to read to you because it's only two sentences long. Mason County code
17.50 0.21 OB three C.
It says conditional use permits are required for new commercial guid duc aquaculture
period. Conversions from existing non guey duck aquaculture to
gooey duck aquaculture within existing farm boundaries do not require a conditional
use permit. There is nothing about expansion because that word was an invention of
the Planning Commission that somehow uh tries to distinguish it from new, but it
is new and Mason Cony has no provision for it. I put this in a letter so you don't
have to remember the citation. Second point on PV C versus HD pe V. Uh black mesh
tubes. They both have their problems and the place to hash it out is in ac up um
hearing, but it's certainly not the case that everybody is going the way of uh black
mesh. We have a PV C in Squirmish Harbor and the only application for Goey Duck in
Jefferson County in the last 10 years is pending and it's for five more acres of
PV C Gey Duck cultivation. Last point. Uh Some if, if I don't know what
the commission is thinking about this afternoon, but if it's anything about uh percentage
expansion, I can just say it's complicated because it's 25% of what you need AAA
marker date. There's some language elsewhere in the code that could be used. You
could, there could be documentation uh from federal permits, et cetera, but it's
complicated. The best thing as you know, is full cup across the board. Uh for
GEX, I look forward to listening in this afternoon. Thank you. Thank you, Michel
Walter. Good morning, Mr Tears.
Uh Good morning commissioners. Uh a couple of items on your consent agenda that I'd
like to talk about. Uh First is number one, which is the uh uh waiving of fees uh
being uh now left up to uh the people that are gonna be charging the fees as opposed
to you commissioners having to deal with a lot of, uh, small items. Uh, that's a
good idea. I like it but there's, there's one big but there, uh, if it's just left
up to the people and nobody knows how many waivers are being granted what the amount
is in total. Uh, that is something that an auditor would likely catch and would report
as a lack of controls. I'm sure you've seen that all the time in audit reports. Um
So I would suggest that allow the uh the people to award these uh these waivers but
require them to report quarterly at least to the county administrator uh And, or
to you. Uh So that you have a feeling for how many of these fees are being waived,
who's doing it and make sure that there's some cross checks here. Uh Before you just
let people spend $500 wherever they feel like it may be for their friends and buddies.
Um item number four on the consent agenda. This is the uh the uh contract with the
Department of Commerce for the, for the pool documents uh evaluation. Um I've been
working on a rebuttal document because I found a lot of problems with the uh the
healthier together final report. There are a lot of errors, a lot of completely wrong
statements, especially from the, the BK portion of the, the study And uh so uh it
would be very helpful if you, you, the county could set up a website, a web page
where all of the documents that are being submitted to the Department of Commerce
could be posted. Uh This is now a county issue. I'm not gonna trust the city to put
that stuff up there on the web, their website because they frankly haven't been posting
everything. Um But everything that's sent to Department of Commerce, if you could
put that up there for further review and analysis, that would be very good and very
uh well, it would be in, in, in the sense of open public records. Yes, we have access
to those after the the evaluation is complete, but that's a little bit too late because
you know, these things need to be carefully analyzed uh due to the number of errors
that have been found already in the documents that have been provided. So that's
my request is that you set up a a web site uh to, to contain all those documents.
Uh There may be more requests from Department of Commerce. So as those requests come
in and new documents are issued, then uh you know, those those can be posted there
as well. Um Also glad to see that the price went down from 18,000 to 11,000. Uh That's
nice occasionally something actually works anyway, that's uh that's my request. Thank
you. Thank you, Mister Tier. I'm go to Miss Cochran.
Hi. Um, I don't know whether you see me or not. Yes. Ok.
Um, my manager told me that you or told the world that during the, um, time
that we were open as a 24 hour shelter, we had 356 visits, 45 people a day on average,
100 and 10 overnight overnight overnight guests, but that's not individuals. 57 people
showed up on one day. That was our busiest day. It was eight nights, 8 24 hour days
and we're all still alive. Um, I also wanna support Harold. Um, I
bought, I arranged for him to have a starter motor so he could get his residential
vehicle going and out of Kai Tai um, parking lot where it was and I was there with
the real team and we thought it was all going to be ok and then it got towed. So
I think that, you know, this isn't, I don't think this is your actual, um, purview.
I think this is a city thing, but I think the county could join it in having just
like a towing b during emergencies during winter, weather storms and whatever other,
you know, smoke emergencies, whatever the weather emergencies are, there should be
a towing ban unless the car is in the way of something, this car was not in the way
of anything. Um, and so I support what he was saying and what Maggie was saying and
what Ariel saying about addresses is a huge issue and it just continues and continues
and continues and whether it's your voting or whether it's being able to get certain
benefits like a free tablet that comes with some wi fi I mean, how useful is that
to the homeless? You know why casual brown people don't have an address, the American
Legion people don't have a address. Obviously the people who aren't anywhere don't
have an address. Um That's not ok. You know, we should be allowing some way of address
for people to be able to get things and that are necessary for survival. So that's
my 20 cents. Have a good day. Thank you, Miss Katherine. And again, thank you for
so much hard work that you and your team put in to keep the welcoming center open
at extended amount of time. You're welcome.
Ok. Could you have your hand up? Ok. Um Anyone else in the room, Mister King,
uh Gordon King, Bell Street Court Townsend, in response to the comments on the SNP,
I would like to clarify that in the original SNP draft. Uh um that was prepared
by the Department of Planning. Uh The D CD in Jefferson County, there were way less
cups, um full cups than is in the present draft. Uh Pathway through
2021 that was changed uh due to comments that was submitted after public
comment had been closed to the Planning Commission. Um to have cup full
cups for everything. Um So now we're in a situation where it is more
cups than the original draft, which was, as I said, prepared by the Jeffrey County
Planning Department, not by the shellfish industry. Um People seem to have this idea
that P BC is toxic. I think most of us get our water through PV C pipes. I'm a little
confused um about being so toxic. Uh The other thing I do appreciate uh Marilyn Shwa
emphasizing the thing about Mason County. In fact, I submitted that um a copy of
that regulation from Mason County to the county commissioners which hopefully they
read, I don't know many things, but yeah, that she's dead, right? Uh Expansion is
not not um is not mentioned in the Mason County one, but there is no cup for conversions
only for new good agriculture. We would be fine. The showish industry would be fine
by that same standard and uh Jefferson County and I really appreciate the show water.
Bring it up. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr King.
Anyone else wish to provide public comments in there almost at time? Um Thank you
all. It's great to have robust public comment. It's been a while since we've had
this engagement. So responses from my CV.
Mhm. Um I can start. Um Yeah, to you and about the van that is in the
city, but I would be curious about the idea of some kind of towing van during emergency
declarations and maybe a review of what, what is, um, afforded by emergency declarations.
You know, I've, I've never whole cloth reviewed the impact of emergency declarations,
but that seems like a good thing to do. Um
Yeah, to Bruce, we all, we all want a pool. It's just that there's been so much
information flying. It's really hard to figure out what, what the current information
is. So as we go through this process with an independent financial review, it'll
be helpful to get a set of information uh from an independent consultant that we
can reflect on because it seems like what I've seen happening is um information coming
out kind of in a trickle or from external parties. And it, it, it created some
confusion about what the information that we're basing our decisions or our recommendations
on actually is. Um and Deborah, yes, we have emphatically
supported the idea of public showers as part of this infrastructure um development
in our community. And um it, it should be clear. And so I don't know if that's telling
Mark or asking Mark to make sure that in the independent financial review that showers
piece for the city and the county, we've all, we've all said that that should be
a priority. Um I called up the memorandum of agreement with the city and public showers
are part of the agreement of any independent financial feasibility review. So I can
guarantee you it will be, um, considered. Ok, great. And the address issue just seems
like the most basic right that I've heard about today. I mean, I don't know what
the, um, what other jurisdictions have done in terms of getting addresses for people
who don't have homes. But it seems like there has to be a way, I mean, I remember
when we were a commercial fishing family and we were traveling up and down the west
coast, we often had our mail delivered to Z graters, fish stopso, California. And
that was where my parents ballots or no, they weren't mail ballots but their um voter
registration cards and stuff came. So I don't know what the um requirements are or
what the legal issues are with voting addresses and all that. But I think that that's
something that um working with the auditor we should be able to find out, but it
sounds like Ariel that you've already worked on that. So curious to look into that
more. But the address issue seems pretty basic to me. I remember and I worked at
the library for library cards. People, sometimes their address like both school students
with the both schools. So I, yeah, I don't know, but it seems like that should be
a basic, right? Um We'll be talking more about the SNP this afternoon. We got a ton
of comments over the weekend and I had a chance to read through all of them. Um,
but there's more, more discussion and deliberation there. So I appreciate people
adding to that but growing body of knowledge um To Tom Tar, I agree
with a quarterly report regarding fee waivers. I mean, it seems like that wouldn't
be a hard thing to do as fee waivers are granted. Mark. So um paragraph three c of
the resolution that the word Press go requires that the department director provide
me a copy of any waiver granted and that I'm to monitor the program. And so if you
have a concern about me and internal controls, then you need to find another count.
Yeah. Right. No, that's good. OK.
And I think just tracking them, uh you keeping us kind of in the loop if they don't
have a file and we can certainly produce it or, you know, review it periodically.
But uh in my six years here, we've had two waivers that I can recall. So this is
not an issue, but I'm a little bit concerned about
um to Julia, I mean, you know, I had the opportunity to see a little bit firsthand
what was going on at the winter warming shelter. And I cannot express the amount
of gratitude I feel for the, the uh Interfaith Action Coalition and Julia herself
and her staff to Ben and Ruby and all the other folks who work at the shelter and
all the folks who relied on the shelter to stay warm and alive over the cold snap.
It was, I mean, my pipes froze three times. So I spent the whole weekend doing plumbing.
So it was, you know, it was unprecedented the duration of the, um, depth of the cold.
Um, and Gordon, yeah, we're gonna talk more about this today. So,
never ending conversation. Oh, it's gonna end sometimes. I doubt it
and said, uh, Heidi. Yeah. All right. Um, I did close public comment but Mister Cook.
Were you hoping to give public comment? Um, no, I'm here for the. That's right. That's
right. Yeah, I was gonna open it up again for you.
Um, all right. I think, uh, Commissioner Eisenhower did a good job in responding
and see what I can add. Um, sorry about your Van Harold Holmes, the, um,
I think the Ninth Circuit court decision about, uh, at least it is being enforced
in Seattle talks about protecting vehicles that are being lived in. You might want
to talk to Jefferson Associated Counsel. I mean, as, as Heidi said, it's, uh, in,
in the city. I don't know who towed it whether it was, you know, transit, not knowing
what the truck was there and having it. I, I don't know any of the situation so it's
hard to be directly responsive, but I'm not willing to. Um, I haven't, I haven't
talked to him yet. I'm just doing what people said, but they said they wouldn't tow
it. I don't, I don't want to get into a back and forth now. But I have a card you
can take it. I'd be happy to follow up afterwards and see what I can do to get you,
uh, in touch with the right people. I might be able to get your van back. I wanna
see if I can help you get that call and then I,
I don't know. Yeah, let's follow up.
Happy to follow up and, uh, for, regarding the, the addresses, you know, I, yeah,
that is a frustrating barrier that, um, it is very real. I know. Um, I don't know.
I'll talk to some agencies maybe po boxes, vouchers for po boxes or something that
can be used. I don't know what, uh, what the solution is but being able to access
ballots and, you know, getting ID becomes difficult if you don't have a of a, of
a resident. So po boxes don't work. I have a po box. They don't work. No. Ok. They're
expensive and, um, they can be, need to be able to, you know, even their notifications
of when it's time to pay your, your yearly or quarterly invoice. Yeah, they don't
work for everything for everything. Got you. Ok. Interesting. Yeah, I don't know,
but it does seem like something we should, uh, take a look at, um, appreciate Mark's
responses to the, uh, the waiver, which I'm really excited about, uh, as well. And
Mr Che other points about the, uh, putting all the reports on the on the website.
And do you see an objection to that? It seems like a, a common sense asked to me.
My initial reaction is, um that, that makes a good deal of sense so that the public
knows what information is being considered by the consultant. And what I'm concerned
about is being bombarded with all sorts of emails and other things that I would have
to track and somehow report on. Um but certainly documents submitted by the city
and by the county and by the Aquatic Coalition and certainly we, we could create
a link on our website for those documents. I think that would be great much transparency
we can provide is good. Appreciate Mr Cohen's uh thoughtful commentary on the pool.
I, I mean, yeah, we're gonna get there. Um You know, I, I grew up Apollo Ona was
just down the street ice skating uh and you know, bringing home an Olympic medal,
but luckily in Britain, they're gonna have a big ice skating rink right harbor. So
maybe,
yeah. Um and yeah, public showers, I think that was addressed, definitely wanna make
maintain that uh focus uh to Zachary. We are looking at short term rentals and, and
um you know, licensing them or looking for some mechanism to be able to control them.
It's, it's difficult for use of a property is something that's pretty precious to
people, especially down in Quilcene. Um I say hi to Richard Foreman. Good guy. Um,
and you know, to the pool, any decision that comes, you know, we're in one step of
a process, but anything will ultimately be decided by the voters on a PFD. So everyone
will have their, their chance to say whether it's a good idea or bad whatever, where
we, where we fall. Um, Janet and Marilyn and, and, uh, Gordon,
appreciate the continued input. We're getting lots of, you know, great input on this
and we will this afternoon, maybe not come to a conclusion but continue to work on
it. So I'll, I'll hold my conversation about there. I love your eternal optimism.
Right.
Uh Again, just echo the thanks to Julia and the whole interfaith coalition for um
keeping the winter warming shelter going. I think as, as Bruce said, it did save
lives over this break. So, protecting people in the emergencies. That is definitely,
I see as a prime responsibility of the county and, uh, you know, we are here for
you. Yeah, it'd be great to get some boilerplate language added to our emergency
declaration that includes not displacing vulnerable populations after that. Yeah.
So the hard part is we, we're often, um, you know, emergencies happen. They, they,
uh they surprise us and so we don't always have the, um the foresight. So it's like,
how can we be prepared now? Workshop about emergency decorations now? Right.
Um All right. Um I largely concur with what my fellow commissioners have said. Um,
I do wanna say just really, really great to have, um, folks from the unhoused population
here. That's, um, we do a lot of work around housing and don't always hear from
the in house and, you know, hearing your lived experience is really helpful and,
um, you know, calls out the really important points, things we need to be paying
attention to things like getting addresses, you know, it's really basic for being
able to, um, you know, for those that want to change their status, to be able to,
to, you know, likely get a job, be able to vote, do, do basic things. Um, address
is really helpful. So thank you for, for being here and for um helping us, you know,
kind of remain aware of, of some of the challenges you're facing. I would agree.
Um uh Mr Colby, the, it's very much a court Townsend police issue. Um Our law
enforcement is through the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department which has the Z
jurisdiction within the city limits. Um So sounds like you need some help in kind
of navigating the um finding the right person to talk to, to see if we can resolve
this. Um And is there just trying to think, is there some someone, you know, you're
gonna be tied up all day, Greg someone we could point to the city Navigator or um,
however, it was during a Jefferson County emergency declaration. So it was actually
a city of Port towns of declaration. Also, the county did not do a declaration, the
city did for the winter welcoming center. So, um, it, it is city and I'm not using
that as a way to shirk responsibility just to say, we have no authority. We, we,
we don't get to call the police and say, give the guy's van back. Um, but, um, do
we know that City Navigator or I'm just trying to think of where they haven't hired
a new police, hasn't hired a new Navigator yet. They're working on it. But, um, the
real team might be, I mean, they were already involved. So it seems like, have you
been connected with the real team already? Do you know? I haven't talked to him yet.
Let me listen to what people are saying. Maybe they didn't even know they took it
illegally. Well, yeah, they did. They did because they, they got to see you close.
So they know they, they tried three days
in Julia's in Julia's comment. She made reference to the vaccine.
That's tricky. We are, we are tied up here all day. So trying to identify who the
person is, would be helpful. Let's, we give it a minute. I wonder if, um, real truthful.
Thank you. That'd be great. And Julia is still in the attendees if, um, Julia has
any ideas, uh, maybe email or text one of us.
Um,
uh, let's see. Uh, Zachary, as, as Commissioner Brotherton mentioned, we are starting
to, um, look at regulating short term rentals because of the impact on the housing
market. Um, I was surprised last week to learn we have 543 unique short-term rentals
in this property that are advertised on various websites. Um, it's a lot more than
we anticipated. That's just in unincorporated Jefferson County of those 76 are permitted.
So there are 400 some unpermitted short-term rentals. And, um, you wanna get an idea
of what that, that impact is? And um it's interesting, I, I live in uptown, I feel
lucky to own a home in uptown Port Townsend um about a long time ago and more and
more the houses around me are unoccupied and it's, um, you know, it was helping out
of the uh winter welcoming center. Um I was able to walk down there, which is nice,
didn't have to drive and was so aware that I was walking past, you know, all these
vacant homes with the thermostat on, you know, to keep their pipes un present and
while we have, you know, dozens of people unhoused and um yeah, very aware of that.
Um Deborah, I am, I, I do think there is a, a rough commitment to keeping the public
showers in the mix of the aquatic center uh in the aquatic center proposal. There's
a lot of components of operations that were not included in that description. And
so I, I I'm not too worried that it's not in there because there's many, many things
that were not included there that are still in the in the mix. Um But we will be
tracking it and make sure that, that, that stays a part of it. You know, there's
still a question as to kind of who's gonna manage that. And um the Y MC A currently
manages public showers, but they have a requirement for identification, which we
know for some folks is a, a barrier. And so trying to figure out what the best uh
best way to manage public showers will be there. Um And that's a ay MC, a requirement
for their own risk management. So um still some uncertainty um more to come
on um the Shoreline Master program and Gooey Duck, of course. And um lots more
to come on the aquatic center too. We still have not been able to have a meeting,
having a hard time scheduling a meeting of the steering committee to start talking
about next steps, you know, and we, we know that we um need to be pulling in some
more voices to that group. Um You do have a meeting scheduled on the 30th. 0, good.
It's on our calendars. Great. All right. Um So lots more to come there too.
Uh Mark or can I say one more thing looks like the real team confirming my intuition
is that it, it's a referral agency. So I think Julia down the Winter Warming Center
can contact them as can Holy Cap. Um but they don't, they don't have a direct line.
So they are a referral organization but uh since they've been involved already, I
would, I would say keep working with Julia and, and as you leave, take a card, I'm
happy to help you interface and do what I can to try to get your van back. Great.
Thank you, Mark anything you want to add. Um I think I made all the comments I need
to. You too. All right. Um and let's see
uh with Matt Tyler here. Um Oh, he's an attending list. Great. You can bring that
over because we next on our agenda is our proclamation for Parks and rec volunteer
appreciation. Do consent after. Oh, sorry, that's fine. There's nothing urgent on
there. Ok, great. So
yeah, over here.
Good morning, Matt. Good morning. You wanna tee this up for us and we have AAA few
of your um board members here. So you know, we have Bessie Karen, my rep and John
Cook. Yeah, I couldn't be there in person but I appreciate you introducing uh them
and thank them for being there.
Uh I don't have much to say about the proclamation. I'll just really quickly uh highlight
that uh we had 4800 and nine hours donated last year. It's the equivalent of 2.31
full time employees and those are the people who are official volunteers. Including
our caretakers and Campos and uh, Doctor Park people as well as people um, in groups
like Quimper Trails Foundation and others who are taking care of our parks. Um Irondale
Beach Park and Indian Island Park are still 100% volunteer maintained. So it's a
holdover from the recession, that's still going strong. Um The donations are valued
at 100 and $52,926. So it's a really pretty serious uh thing and we would not survive
without our volunteers. Um The other major group of volunteers is our coaches who
serve in our rec programs and that's how we're able to provide such a large impact
in our rec programs with just one person. So that's all I have to say. And thank
you so much for considering this proclamation. Thank you, Matt. So we will uh read
the proclamation and um then ask our uh parks and rec uh board members to come up
and speak if they so wish. So. Um should go Greg Heidi me. Sounds good. Uh
Proclamation proclamation, officially recognizing the hard working volunteers of
Jefferson County Parks and recreation in order to promote service to value and commemorate
the many selfless contributions made in care of the county parks and in support of
youth recreation program participants. Whereas Jefferson County Washington operates
22 parks on 1100 acres and provides recreational sports leagues, the Port Towns and
recreation Center, summer camps and specialized classes and events and whereas parks
and recreation would not function without volunteer service. And whereas volunteer
services include coaching, youth sports rec center programming, youth summer camps,
park maintenance, construction of park amenities, live on site, live, live on site,
park caretakers, trail construction and maintenance, landscape, gardening, habitat,
restoration, advisory board membership. And whereas the county recognizes that volunteerism
builds community, promotes the economy, improves mental and physical health and benefits
the natural environment. And whereas in 2023 parks and rec volunteers donated 4809
hours, the equivalent of 2.31 full time employees. And whereas www dot independent
sector.org estimated that one hour of volunteerism is valued at $31.80. And whereas
the total value of parks and recreation volunteer hours donated in 2023 is $152,926.
And now therefore, be it proclaimed with the Jefferson County Board of County Commissioners
has hereby recognize the volunteers of Jefferson County parks and recreation for
their devotion, dedication and service and desires a permanent record of their accomplishments.
Approved this 22nd day of January 2024 little formatting issue. I think other uh
proclamation here,
motion to approve the proclamation is I will gladly move that we adopt and approve
this proclamation as read. I will enthusiastically second that, ok. All those in
favor, please say I right with any of the members of the park board like to come
up and say a few words. Are you still chair? Are you still chair?
Chair? Chair? Yeah. Yeah. With the chair just um when I came on the board,
Kate was the commissioner assistant then hiding now. Great. Um I just
wanted to emphasize we volunteer for this, but we are nothing compared to the guys
out there creating trails and cleaning trails and kids coaching kids. So, um I just
appreciate you guys making a recommendation so that Matt can get it out to those
people. And we're still trying to open chic. Yeah, it's open. You mean make
it a campground,
please enjoy T park. I don't think it's well, well enough. You good morning.
Um Just wanted to say that our volunteers are key in helping us develop
the park and recreation programs um that we have that are such a wonderful asset
to the community. So, thank you very much for the information. Thank you, miss anything
you'd like to add.
Um Any additional comments for, you know, parks and rec is always one of those departments
that's not mandated. There's so many things that we do as a county that we have to
do. You know, we have to provide law enforcement, we have to provide roads. We don't
have to provide parks and rec and every year when this comes around and I'm often
reminded about 22 parks with the staff that we have is pretty phenomenal. So, yeah,
it's, it's, it's on the shoulders of the volunteers and I just appreciate you guys
being here and, you know, being here every month and, and contributing to that uh
to, to one of the real pleasures of, of Jefferson County and something that makes
us a, a healthier community. So thank you and just say that, you know, and um I grew
up near the Chimica Beach Park in Irondale and uh spent, can't say how many hundreds
of hours over the course of my life in that park still go to that park three times
a week at least. Um And I'm super grateful for the set of volunteers that banded
together to form friends, friends of Chim Creek and, and, you know, there's still,
um I think it's still the same guy who takes the garbage to the dump there when we
formed that volunteer group, it was a, I'll, I'll do the dump run. And so he's still
taking all the dog food to the dump. So super grateful for volunteers to step up
and take care of the parks in their backyards and in our county.
Yeah. And um I just wanna say too, we, we also have, you know, to remind people we
have the highest number of state park properties in our county as well of any county
in the state. Um And you know, volunteers that are helping to keep those parks as
vibrant as they are. And I mean, just the spirit of volunteerism in this community
is so valuable. And, um, you know, the thing about parks and rec is that it, it,
it pays dividends in so many ways for health, for, uh, substance use, uh, prevention.
This has been been proven again and again. Um, uh, I think about the, the coaches
and John, you've coached, do you, you get credit for, for that level of volunteerism
as well? Um I mean, you know, what, how many, how many basketball or soccer teams
there's, you know, probably 12 at a time or something and hours and hours and hours
go into in direct contact with you. And um that's just invaluable. It's invaluable
for the kids. It's invaluable for families, it's invaluable for health. Um So the,
the ripple effect of this volunteer work is much greater than we can possibly measure
here. And um advisory board is, is mandated and um does really important work in
helping us to set priorities and determine policy. So don't underestimate the value
of that either. Thank you all for being here. Thanks for your efforts. Thanks to
everybody who's listening. Thanks to Matt and your staff doing such a great job.
All right. Uh Thanks Matt. Let me take a look at consent agenda real quick.
Mm I have to say I, I was really excited looking at this consent and I think there
was a lot of great stuff, you know, Mr Tier uh amplified that, that commerce contract
came in a little lower than we expected. It is always a nice, was all over the board.
Yeah, it was 15 and 19. So that is the weirdest state program I have ever interfaced
with and I, with a lot of weird ones like horse massage licensing. Ok. Wow, that's
pretty weird. Yeah, this is weirder. Wait, the horses give massages.
It's quite a hated massage before. I hate it even more if a horse was giving it to
me. Um, and I, I just want, I guess I'd amplify 18, the, uh, full time equivalent
position for the information Technology officer. Um, you know, it was sad to see
Sarah. I'm glad she's still in the county. Um, but, yeah, totally. I got that note
today. Uh, my only concern is that, uh, amount up to $100,000. I don't think it is
realistic. I'm wondering if we should do a salary study or borrow Jeff Com salary
study. I don't even want to see what we, uh, I'd like to add a little context if
I could. Um, so in meeting with, um, Mikey and Todd, um, and
Renee, um, what we're looking for here is probably an, is two or three to
handle service desk calls. You know, the lower level tasks, the tend to distract,
um, higher level, uh, employees from, from doing their higher level work. Um,
simply running through a printer problem or low level things. Um, And as I mentioned
to you this morning, Greg that this is probably step one and a two step process.
Um But the immediate need in addition to recruiting for the two vacancies, um and
we do have a couple of promising candidates for uh Sarah's position um would be to
get them to help. Um So that, um you know, the work order requests that come in on
that automated system are dealt with in a prompt way because that affects productivity
of the people who have the problem as well. If I can't do my work, then I'm not doing
my work. And so um once Tracy gets here, we'll conduct a higher level review and
um will likely compare compensation for these positions with um our co counties
to help us improve our ability to recruit. Excellent. That sounds great. I would
just encourage, let's let's leverage the work that's already been done at Jeff com
since we did go to that, that, that same work recently. But I did have a similar
like the reaction to the salary for an it professional. I was like, really? Yeah,
can I ask you a question though? I'm, I'm curious with a new central services director
coming in. Is there um and, and with so many, well, two vacancies and then potentially
adding another position. Is there, is there any logic in letting the new director
kind of think about how she wants to structure that department? Um The second step,
which I think is a much more um will require much more thinking. Uh For
example, do we hire a managerial type who's not um you know, a bargaining unit member
to do the strategy and the architecture and, and the higher level tasks. Um That's
a discussion that needs to wait for Tracy to get here. Uh This uh however, is fundamental
and basic and I've already talked the tracing about this. And so I, I think proceeding
with this is a prudent thing to do.
Well, if I can ask one more question on number 14, supportive of course. And, you
know, I think it's already budgeted for the jabs uh maintenance. I'm just wondering,
I feel like I see jabs all the time. Do we have separate contracts in District and
Superior Court? Is there any way we can? There's no way we can combine those and
I probably asked this every year. It's for equipment upgrades in District court and
Superior Court has their own separate equipment they need. But this one in particular
is being paid out of the trial court. It just, I mean, I don't know if there would
be economies of scale. Certainly I can get with Sophie and Brian and, you know, we
could explore that as long as they've been, you know, talked about it and make sure
they're not economies of scale, right? I don't need to make, make busy work or anything.
Um And then just really grateful to see all the uh uh housing fund board recommendations
turned into contracts so quickly. And the last one just still sad that we could not
expend all those funds and get them out into the community for the affordable house
dollars. So, get your construction to get projects together. I guess. Hopefully the
providers got the memo this year that, you know, we need capital projects that we
can use, that make up the operations funds out of some other imaginary. That's the
challenge. Yeah, I guess I would just say that number 15, the Tum Confluent Confluence
Project. It's a long, long time um code compliance issue in our community out in
District two and super grateful for the creative thinking that's going into this
one. And um you know, Old Hadlock Road becomes more difficult to navigate all the
time. So, um I think that this is the right thinking to address the whole site and
work with the landowner on a kind of a resolution of this issue. Finally, on cue,
I think you walked in what a confluence
just talking about the chem confluence project on consent agenda.
All right. Um I don't think we are pulling anything. Are we some consent? No, I think
the the concerns have been addressed. I'm happy to move that we approve and adopt
the consent agenda as presented. I'll second that any further discussion, all those
in favor P CIA I consent is approved unanimously. So we have a, a
1015 discussion um of reconvening the Growth Management steering committee. Um But
that's about 10 minutes out and then a 1030 workshop, implementation of new enterprise
permit and licensing. So excited, so excited for this. I love previewing the slide
deck. So you know
what our department directors want to hear these. I'm so excited about, I've been
sharpening my knives.
Um So any uh interest in a break break? Ok, great.
Let's take a break until 1015. Great, thanks and um
in progress.
Ok, we are coming back into session after a short break. Um I like to welcome Josh
Peters, director of U CD and Emma Boen, Director of Planning and Community Development.
I get it right. All right. Um To talk about reconvening the Growth Management steering
committee. So welcome hands up to you, Josh. Thank you Jordi. We a following a discussion
with the board. Recently, we prepared a resolution for essentially the reconvening
the Growth Management steering committee as part of the 2025 periodic update. And
that, that committee would be used as a way to have intricate discussion around a
few specific elements, principally population projections from the state. Which one
will we choose? And then where will we allocate that population over the next 20
years to the year 2045? Also, we have the counter by planning policies that were
a precursor to our first G MA compliant Comprehensive Plan in 1998 and we haven't
amended those policies since the nineties. So that's another thing we could talk
about too. And there's been discussion in the past about whether we want to update
those policies or not. There's new state legislation that talks about a tribal participation
component to the countering planning policy amendment process. So that's something
that we also discussed. And we put the basic facts of all of these into this resolution
for your consideration. I was speaking with Emma Bowen about it and we talked about
the composition of the committee and even though we steered away from having voting
members versus non voting members and and some of the other things that perhaps have
characterized the committee in the past rather, it would be a discussion forum. It's
really these committees, meetings are going to be board meetings with special guests
if you, if you think of it in that way, because we also want to incorporate other
stakeholders that wouldn't be necessarily members of the committee but would have
important things to say, special purpose districts such as the fire districts and
the school districts is an example. Anyway, when we started talking about the composition,
we were just reflecting what was discussed at the last meeting. So, and you'll see
that section one and the whereas in page three of the proposed resolution, it talks
about that composition and mentions two representatives of Port Townsend. I'm gonna
let em of course speak to this. Um More specifically, my understanding is that they've
traditionally had three members that are part of their Growth Management Committee
of the City Council. Thanks so much Josh. Um Emma Boland, Director of Planning and
Community Development for the city of Port Townsend. Um The city is really pleased
to uh collaborate with the county on this um important and intricate work as Josh
mentioned. Um And uh I think it's important um the city believes it's important to
get the composition correct for this committee and ensure that we have um representation.
Um We've already assigned the council committee assignments. Um And so we have three
very eager um council members who um uh the the mayor for what actually was elected
mayor because of his interest in the Comprehensive Plan. Um And really would like
to dig in um to this committee. Um We want to make sure that, you know, we're well
matching. Um And so we would recommend, um you know, retaining the three city council
members um that were assigned to the committee that way we don't face the political
decision of who to eliminate once they've already been assigned. Um And we also support,
you know, efficiency and having a concurrency based committee with the special guest
as Joshua mentioned. Um since there's gonna be some really important topic to get
through over the next couple of months.
Mhm.
Thank you. So, um what would be helpful in terms of the scope of the conversation
today, Josh, mm if we wanted to respond affirmatively to what MS Moen has
presented, then we would simply change one word in section one on page three of the
proposed resolution from two representatives of the Port Towns and City Council to
three representatives of the Port Towns and City Council. Just on a related note,
it does say one representative of the Commission of the Port of Port Townsend. My
understanding is there may be actually a staff member assigned to that being the
deputy director is probably doesn't matter too much in some ways, we interpret this
as whatever those parties want to do in terms of representation. So, but unless we
want, we could choose to generalize that rather than saying commission or we could
just leave it as it is and, and assume essentially that the commission of the 44
Council has decided to illustrate changes in that spot. So there's that. And then
finally, um
we also, we have talked about picking a, a representative uh essentially of your
selection to for the Irondale Port Hadlock urban growth area and whether we make
that decision now or sometime soon from my standpoint, I just need to know where
we're heading with that so that when we put out the invitations, we make sure to
include that person. So that's something else we could talk about if we have time
here before the next item at 1030
that on composition. So I'm wondering in terms of the, um, and the
purview of the steering committee,
do we have balanced geographic representation, I guess, is what I'm wondering, um,
if there's three folks from the city of port towns and should there be more people
from the new UG A in havoc that wouldn't be balanced representation either, would
it? Well, I mean, there's the three of us, right? So we're balanced and then there's,
I don't know, I just don't know what the exact um duties of the steering committee
are to understand the implications of the geographic makeup of the, of the commission
or committee. But we started to talk about this last time in terms of the history
of this committee starting in the nineties and then adding the 4th 1999 and then
in 2015 was the last time we went through this population allocation process. We
had three representatives is my understanding from the court, Hadlock UG A. I also
would say that in the past, perhaps it's a little more formalized in terms of voting
membership and things like that. And if we're steering it more towards a discussion
forum, all three county commissioners would be part of this. So essentially, it's
a, it's a board of county commissioners meeting with particular stakeholders involved.
So the, the basics of the committee or the basic responsibilities are to advise you
uh because it is a county that would essentially select the population allocation
in coordinating with cities. And of course, we only have one and then allocate population
accordingly. Um For the G MA we have some additional things to talk about this, this
cycle because of the housing element changes that were enacted by the legislature
which involves planning for income bans. And so we've started that conversation with
the city, another meeting set up this week for that and that is something we want
to talk to the steering committee about and then eventually reach a recommendation
essentially for your consideration and action. In the past, there's been a joint
resolution for population allocation between Church County and our only city, the
city of Fort Town. Uh There are other members. And if you've heard from the last
um Intergovernmental Collaborative Group meeting that want to be part of the conversation
around growth as a whole throughout the county. I remember, for example, the Pud
wanted to talk about planning for power and water in that conversation. And then,
um I guess I would say that you could go and, and, and find three people from the
four UJ. If you wanted to become part of that conversation, whether formally or informally,
essentially, I think we were leaning towards just having one person just to streamline
the process and to get it going because we'd really like to have the first meeting
on February 8th. If we can't, then we'll just delay it. But the reason why again,
just to remind you was that was one week prior to the next IC G meeting. And so if
we were able to start the conversation through this committee, perhaps even choose
one of the um ranges of population estimation, lower medium high, then we could report
out those results in the following week and then talk about what the steering committee
was planning to do ahead. We've got a party started collaborating with the city staff
on planning out say four or five steering committee meetings, period. So in some
ways, grabbing, trying to find three people and then assigning them in that respect
would be in a a lot of effort in to get four or five meetings going. However, all
that said, if you have three people in mind just have to change the word, just change
the number right there in the resolution. I hope it doesn't take five minutes, five
meetings to come to the medium conclusion which I'm happy to vote on right now. But
we were doing that for the first and then. But the other things are a little bit
more complicated than the income housing ban situation. We know that the housing
data needs an assessment committee meeting of the housing front board that was delayed.
And so we're, we wanna listen to those parties before we come to a staff recommendation
about that. So that would be in future meetings. And then we have the whole county
back planning policy which we wouldn't want to rush into that because especially
because of the new statutory reports, I guess I have a clarifying question for Emma.
Really? And, and that's how does this interface with uh the city's planning and their
comp plan? I mean, in the same way that, that uh I, I, I'm fine with three city council
members, I'll just say on, on this, on this committee. And I, I'm, I also think that
the city planning, I just finding, finding harmony between the city and the county
is something II I really appreciate you guys leading and I want to participate in
it. And I, you know, I think this committee might have conversations about city planning
or I mean, what, what's the interface there, I guess is my question, I think that
we need to consider, you know, the give and take between the city and county in terms
of how we're gonna meet our statutory requirements for housing. And so we don't,
you know, we need to do some more um baseline assessment to figure out where we fall
all within um those requirements and what our projected housing is going to be. And
so I think that you're gonna want, you know, um experts on both sides to be talking
about um where they see infill growth or, you know, where it can happen and you know,
your, your UG A is gonna really factor into that. So, um you know, having somebody
on and representing the, your UG A tri areas. We are also UG A so we gotta keep them
straight. Um I think will be important as well. So it's probably wise to have somebody
who understands the growth patterns there. Um I, I guess I don't
really have anything else more to say on it other than it will be a process to ensure
that, you know, we are where, you know, you cannot fit that we can fit and vice versa.
So, OK, I guess what I was really, I don't think I was very clear in my question.
Um Will this committee have any recommendations to the city?
Good question. Um I think that this committee may yield some recommendations on
um how growth is going to occur for council in terms of um just
very broadly. Are we looking at more grain field developments? Are we looking at
maximizing infield developments? Um What we also have going on on top of that is
an urban forestry plan and an active transportation plan update and we have some
little housing um funded work to do as well. Um So there may be some recommendations
um based off of what you find out about, you know, your tri areas. Um UT A um I think
it would be really important for us to understand what level of housing can be accommodated
there. So it will help us with our baseline data. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. I could
just add on to what I just said, I see this committee as being principally an advisory
committee to the board of county commissioners for these county responsibilities,
choosing a population estimation to plan for allocating that population and also
the county planning policies. But it'd be impossible essentially to make a recommendation
without taking into a context what all the various um entities are doing, especially
the city. So guess I would look at it that way, but it's a great place to have this
conversation. Can I ask a follow up clarifying question which is um do city and county
need to reach concurrence on those um those housing allocation and population estimates?
Um So do we have to put in our account plans the same allocation? I'm not looking
at the, the G MA in front of me right now, but I believe the word is in coordinations,
coordinate with cities decisions. There may be other cases, I can picture other counties
that have numerous cities having uh boisterous discussion and perhaps difficulty
achieving unanimity across the board. I, I do, I believe ultimately it's a county
responsibility to do it. But clearly incoordination with cities is the right way
to go. It's always been that way in Jefferson County with our one city. And so we
don't anticipate any trouble there. What we anticipate is just having some choices
to make this time that are gonna look a little bit different than last time, just
based on a variety of factors. Sewer gonna come, come online in 2025 we're talking
about as, you know, um, changing the port towns in urban growth area boundary. It's
the first time it's been talked about, I think since the 19 nineties. And so those
are things that, that naturally we would want to be in agreement about. And I think
this, there's a staff level effort there and then this is a great way to continue
that conversation broader with the board. We also have the IC T, of course. And then
ultimately, we'd have to make some choices together. So I guess I would look at it
being a county person perhaps biased, but also the way the act is set up Countywide
planning policies, for example, are the responsibility of the county. And of course,
we want input from everybody who's interested. And I would say that if we're going
to start talking about actually taking an action to change the Port Townsend urban
growth area boundary, we would want the county by planning policies to reflect that.
It, it's sort of the, the talk that we're having now, which is why we're front loading
these meetings, four or five meetings. Now, this first half of 2024 is in order to
set the table for us to continue planning, which will go all the way through to 2025
at least. Mark, did you have something? Well, I was gonna say, uh 2016, uh Clark
County we had six cities to deal with and we came to agreement on population allocations
much six times as difficult as this will be. Um Yeah, although we do have some complicating
factors and I think Josh Dis discuss them uh expanding the UG A of the city potentially
and, and of course, the great unknown of the UG A in Hadlock uh will growth there
be meteoric or will it be sluggish? We don't know. Um So reaching agreement would
be, um I don't think challenging, but, but certainly take some work,
I'll say my, um uh Josh and I talked about it this weekend a little bit. My, um my
only concern about the composition was just how much of the Countywide planning policies
are really specific to county interests and outside of um kind of the, the interests
of the city. And I still don't have an answer to that question. But um I'm not, I'm
not too concerned about proceeding with the three city members, but I, I do wanna
acknowledge they have different interests and, you know, and I, I have a great deal
of respect for city staff and city council members that they are, you know, tasked
with uh their interests and ours, ours are broader. Um And so I, I wanna set us up
for success and that, so that we are working together on the things where those interests,
um you know, overlap or sometimes, you know, might be at, at odds with one another.
But that's the task is to, to figure that out. But then if, if we're talking about
specifically rural issues that, um, you know, that we're not, you know, trying to,
to have equal footing with the city when it's like, no, this is actually our authority
and our, um, purview. So just wanna, I would still like to better understand the,
the, uh, scope of the county planning policies. And I don't, and I haven't seen them
and we talked about this, where do we even, where do they live right now? We don't
know where to find them. So, um just, you know, I just wanna be aware that there
are, there might be issues that come up that it's um where that equal representation
of electives I think is um you know, just could be, could get a little bit tricky
and I have good faith that we will be able to figure it out. But um for us because
it's just advisory this time and not, I think my eliminate that because of the threat
as an example. So, you know, I've been interested in this um kind of rural village
model where we allow the sun or that. Yeah, in a, in a lamer to acknowledge the,
the services that lamer already provide. And is there a way that we can do a better
job of creating density there that prevents sprawl that can be better served by transit,
you know, using a, a smart mo planning model for Lalor and, you know, the city very
well might not have interest in that or even be opposed to it. And you know, that,
but that is like that does fall clearly into our purview. Um We're
not allowed to really increase much um uh population there with current restrictions
to Lamar. So I, I don't think it's too involved with the um uh allocation discussion.
So it just, you know, there are things that I think that we, we'll have to kind of
figure out as we go. Um But again, without knowing the purview of the kind of planning
policies, it's a little hard to, can I throw a brainstorm on, on top of your comment?
And that's what if we had someone from the Brennan Lamer as a member which would
represent Lambers in general. Also, something that is a lot of planning work is going
into Brennan right now trying to sort out a myriad of issues. So, um what would you
guys think about as well as the three city council members? Uh Brennan Lamar, I guess.
What, what, sorry, I'm facing the wrong way. What would you guys think about adding
uh a a Brennan representative
feels like we might want to consider adding a Shimon Laor representative. You know,
there's a lot of conversations happening there right now. I mean, I mean, we could,
this could become a I, I get it. We need to be nimble and able to move. And I'm hearing
that and thinking, well, yeah, I, I have identified one person in the Port Ilug a,
I'm comfortable, I'm excited about and I feel like if we keep adding, it's just gonna,
yeah. No, it puts ungainly pretty quickly, especially for the immediate need. Is
this initial work for that to be able to proceed with the comp plan? Um And then
I think we've kind of left with the ability to invite other folks in for um appropriate
discussion, stakeholders. That was gonna be my response. And I know we're starting
to lead into the next child care. But I guess I would say that principally in the
past my understanding of those population allocation resolutions is that they simply
say, um here's the estimate that we're choosing and we're allocating this percentage
of that to this UG A, this percentage to that UG A and the rest of it to the rest
of the world land. So I guess I would say that you might wanna have this other discussion
around LA. It's actually, especially if you're worried about sort of the interests
um not aligning or even being something that you believe is outside of the city's
principle of interest to have that discussion elsewhere. Like for example, the Planning
Commission or having special meetings where we dedicate to that particular topic,
I can already think of one topic that's gonna be like that, which is probably gonna
be something to do with the Indian nation, which has nothing to do with the City
Court Council because that will be a Countywide planning policy issue according to
hospital 1717. So I guess I would think of it more like uh special interests, special
stakeholders are invited to conversations and if you want to run that through this
body, great. If you don't, we have, we have other forums like such as the Clinic
Commission. And ultimately, again, it's just advisor. If you wanted to find out where
things maybe don't align, this could be a good form to have that discussion, then
you could at least learn what the, what the city council who are representing the
city, think about a particular issue. But ultimately kind of way of planning policies
are something that the county would choose to amend. Yeah, and I just wanna set us
up for success. Um hm after uh you know, kind of exacerbating
divisions or different interests, I'm, I'm very flexible. I make one more pitch for
Brennan though, looking at the last uh population uh projections, one of the big
population growth areas is pleasant harbor. We have an N pr going in there as well
as a lamer. So I just, it's, it's one of the areas that we are pushing growth representation
and that from that area seems reasonable to me, but I'm, you know, I'm happy to add
the three and I also just one other thing. Looking at the section one, I think a
representative of the Commission of the Port to Port Towns and as long as they take
action in a meeting, I think that's the current language is fine for that. But if
we're going to amend it anyway, it could just say a representative of the port of
Port. I mean, yeah, although I mean, we are talking mostly about electives here.
So if they make the action to delegate, it's not, it wouldn't be a problem with the
existing language,
right? Any other uh comments again, like, I wish I could see the counting my planning
policies to see how many of them are gonna deal with Brennan. You know, what's the
range of issues that those are? I think it's only like 1516, 17, but I will, I will
send you that as soon as I get back to the office, Mr Dean. And I guess I would also
say that
this committee can deal with any issue you wish it to. So, in other words, if there
are Countywide planning policies that specifically deal with the gateway between
unincorporated Jefferson County and city for county, that could be an issue that
this committee wrestles with. Um, if you want, I guess I would say that if there's
other county planning policies that don't involve the city, I mean, it's your choice
to move it through this committee for, for advice or not, you know, II I look at
it that way. But I ideally become the concurrence on the way planning policies with
the city too. Right? And this is a forum to do that and it's, you said it's not necessarily
required or if you look at the act and it, it's pretty simple and it says it doesn't
talk about committees and things like that. It just says the count of the population
allocation coin with cities and then there's a section on count planning policies
and ultimately, it's a county Countywide thing. And as you know, so Kane County is
what, 39 cities. So every, every county does it differently. Yeah, I'm happy to move
that. We approve a resolution re-establish a multi jurisdiction Growth Management
steering committee for the purpose of advising the board of County commissioners
on Growth Management Act planning activities including but not limited to population
projections and population and employment allocation and amending Countywide planning
policies. Amending resolution 107-91 resolution 128-92 and resolution
40-99 with how many city council members
presented it to o and adding in section one
um amending, amending section 123 representatives of the Port Townsend
City Council.
I'll second but I like a little more conversations. All right discussion. Um You
guys aren't interested in that Brandon member. I mean, have you looked at the last
planning projections? I've looked at them but I I it pushes a lot of growth to
Brennan right now. Is it residential growth? Yeah, 800 units at uh Living Harper.
But are those considered, they're listed in the comp plan as residential? I mean,
they're, you know, most of them are, most of those units are not full time residents.
But similarly, there's a lot of complexity coming online with the new urban growth
area in the county in Port Hadlock and we have one person representing that. So you're
right. We do have representation.
Um I,
I can do. It's so like I wish I understood the scope better of the um
entity. Um I'm certainly not opposed to having representation from Britain. I'm,
you know, I think what, what we want to accomplish is that the right people are at
the table for the right conversations. Um And
yeah, I guess you could, you could cut that different ways. Um I do not believe we
were planning to have um a public comment on this. I think in the interest of time
since we're already going well into our next item. I'm not gonna take uh public comment
at this time. Um I am not opposed to adding a, a written representative.
I'm not opposed to it either, but I just feel like it to Josh's comment. I mean,
when we add complexity to a pretty focused group to get this initial work done, it
adds complexity. But let say is fine. Mhm Would you be willing to amend your motion.
Ok. You could just amend your motion to include a addition of a representative of
the Briton Ug A and so happy to accept a friendly amendment of adding one
representative representative of the Brennan Lamer. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Ok. I consider
that a friendly amendment. All right, accepted any further discussion. OK. All those
in favor of adopting the resolution with two amendments as discussed today. Please
say II I
thank you guys so much.
So that's a 10 member board. So you need 641 12
county. Next, we have a workshop on the implementation of the enterprise permit and
licensing. So folks don't mind coming up and getting set up, who needs to. And um,
thank you. Thanks, you guys. Thanks so much. Thanks, Josh,
I need to bring more.
I, I think that is new sherry to begin with as needed.
Good to see everyone here though. Really excited about this. I remember talking about
this during my campaign. Are you gonna queue this at Mark? Um Yes, I am. Thank you.
Um So commissioners, um, we're gonna talk about Energo today. That's a name that's
sort of infamous these days. So, um before we get started and before I put
the, the presentation up on the screen, I just like to make sure that the commissioners
are aware of who's in the room over there is our permit center coordinator and gov
expert soon be right. You're on Steve learning curve. Uh Aaron Martin. So is here
our fire marshal and building official, Scott Carpenter. Uh one of the slides here.
When you hear about mitigation measures, he's a mitigation measure our database expert.
Then of course, Josh is a community development director, Apple Martin, public health
director, picking Mingo, uh environmental public health manager. And then of course,
Sherry Mulan, who's in the hot seat today. She's our contracted project manager,
which is another mitigation measure that you'll see on the slide. And um I think
the board knows that this has been a problematic uh implementation. I think we started
in 2018 about the same time, we started with Muni Financials. Um We went live on
Muni Financials in the summer of 2021 and I've had great success with that. We had
much more difficulty with this implementation. And uh I, I do need to say that um
we were implementing a new permitting system in Clark County and it was a remarkably
difficult and uh problem plagued implementation as well, even though we went with
um a work day, I believe, instead of uh inter um coming off a time mark that we've
been on for what 25 years proved to be a, a difficult thing to do. Um And so with
that, I'm going to chew up uh the presentation for the benefit of the public.
Thank you, Apple.
Think that
next
get in the presentation.
You this one done. Sorry, my mouth hand was encumbered.
There you go. So, cherry before is yours just tell me when to advance the side. Good
morning. So, uh, I've been on board since late, late August, uh, and it was brought
in to, uh, help with the implementation of GOV. And so it's been a steep
learning curve for me and, uh, getting to know the product and the team and everything.
So this is kind of a culmination of like where I feel like where we're at, what we've
been able to do where our challenges are that kind of thing. Um I do wanna make a
note here that uh the recent version upgrades of inter gov and moving forward, it
will be called enterprise permit and licensing. EPL. So um I know we're all used
to calling it air Gov, but probably need to start changing that and then when we're
referring to it with the software vendor and stuff, um that's what they call it.
So we're gonna go through accomplishments, uh challenges. I know you guys are uh
getting a lot of pressure from the CS S portal. So opening this up to the public
and what we need to do in order to accommodate that. Uh And then our next steps.
So next slide I left this in, this was the in, in the last presentation I thought
it was kind of fun because it, it does, you know, this is a long process to get this
thing in and all facets of it working. So, uh we're kind of at the toddler stage
right now, I guess. And I will go over that handout that I sent you. I didn't get
it done before this presentation went out. So I just thought I would give it to you
as an attachment. Um And that will help to draw some bulls eyes on the targets for
what we need to do to advance in our stage of life up here. So,
no. Ok. So, accomplishments um in the last six
months, uh Scott and the it team have worked diligently to get the product upgraded.
We were behind several versions and um Tyler was gonna stop support for the versions
that we were on. So we were really under the gun to get those upgraded. Uh And so
we've gone through a couple of versions. We are now at the latest and greatest of
uh what inner gov or I'm sorry what Tyler has. So, and uh now it's called BPL. Um
And one of the first things that I started on was to document some of the core processes.
We have a lot more to go, but we've got, you know, seven or eight done. One of the
things I found out was we were trying to configure this application to have behaviors
that were in people's heads, they were never written down. They were not pro there's
no process flows or anything like that. And truthfully you could take two different
people from the same department and they might have a slightly different way that
they wanna do it. And so that's not the way we wanna make this tool behave. We wanna
agree on a process and then let's configure it. And then that way we can dish that
work out to folks if we can get some consultants in to help or, you know, give somebody
a process flow and say this is the behavior we want. So I've listed the ones that
are there and I'm happy to give you guys printouts of those if you want, they're
nice looking process flows and eventually we'll have like narrative. So actually
process steps to go through it. So if we hire a new inspector or we could say here,
here's the process flows, you participate, here's the narratives on how to use inner
gov for it. So we have nothing to spin people up. It's nothing kind of shoulder surfing
right now. And so when people leave, which there's been a lot of that, we lose a
lot of tribal knowledge and then we have to spin folks up with not a lot of documentation
stuff. So that's been very helpful. And now we can all agree on this is the process
flows are really what I call future state. So it's not necessarily how we're doing
it today. It's how we wanna do it, incorporating the tool in every step of the way.
Uh When I started, there was a problem log that had a lot of issues on it. Uh We
added a lot more because I became a central repository. If there's something that
we need to change with the tool or something that's not working, send them all to
me. I wanna collect them all so that then we could prioritize them and then start
knocking them out. So we've knocked out about 40. Uh We have right now currently
have 98 and that flexes all the time because we're adding some too. So um but we
are making pretty good progress on that. Um We've got the ipads working and it feels
like the guru on that if you wanna can kind of tell that that's a really cool solution,
the ipads with being able to do inspections and sure. Do you want me to come up?
However, you want to check the more the board hears yours today, the better check.
Thanks for the fire marshal hat, by the way that
you have to t about it. I don't need one. I look terrible at base. I want my car
that I'm so, yeah, if you look at uh jumping just a little bit ahead to uh what Sherry
has provided in the sheets in front of it. A lot of the green on the D CE side is
actually in my team, which um was a by no accident. I mean, there was a lot of uh
configuration that I did early on. Uh I also think that our team, uh the building
probably has the most amount of staff that attended the actual Tyler training that
was here at the courthouse. So, you know, we lost a lot of that. Fortunately, in
my apartment, we didn't have a whole lot of on my team rather we didn't have a whole
lot of turnover. Uh We have a new permit tax and that's great. Uh They've come on
board and done really well with it. Uh So at this point with EPL from permit intake
through the workflow over the new stage inspections, uh issuing the permit. And um
actually, I should check your occupancy all happen through EPL. So that's what I
would consider an accomplishment. Um You talk about the ipads because I know they
weren't working out. So it's EPL on the ipads. And so there, there's a, there's kind
of a, there's an app called uh IG Inspect, which is through Tyler, uh which interfaces
with uh EPL. And so we also went through with each one of those inspections. When
we go out on the field, it's uh recording live, you know, it's real time. So as we
go through this inspector goes through and signs things off, I can tell immediately
within the portal. You know, the portal obviously isn't public facing yet, but I
can see it on the backside and I do it to kind of track and see where the inspectors
are during the day. Uh There's also some reporting features in here that work really
well, uh that like I can see, you know, what the average uh inspection time is, what
the average uh inspection, how many inspections per day an inspector can do. You
know, granted, you know, geographically it depends on the day, but on average, it
helped us a lot to develop a performer for future uh inspections and things like
that. You know, what should be a, a benchmark, you know, for, for what we can expect
to do. Um As far as the ipads themselves, we've had really, really good interaction
uh with our contractors because at the push of a button, at the end of the inspection,
we can send that inspection result. If there is corrections, it's fantastic. We can
list the corrections, we can snap a picture with the ipad, we can send it off in
an attachment or an email. So, you know, a picture worth 1000 words. That is exactly
what it is we, you know, uh need additional mailing here. Take a big circle of it,
send it off, you know. So there's no miscommunication between that. Uh We still currently
are um carrying around paper corrections as well. Uh for, you know, some folks that
aren't as tech savvy or would prefer something to remain on site. Um The biggest
thing on that they can't follow up, they will get an email but they couldn't follow
up on a data on a portal per se. Pensar CS S portal. The show is gonna go into, uh,
pretty much using the program as it is designed to use with some hiccups granted.
Um, but we're able to use it on a daily basis. So I would, I would, uh, call that
an accomplishment
and instead of cutting tie you're wearing. Yes, it is. I'm glad you did that. I know.
Yeah. Very nice though. He only wears that when he appears before.
Sorry to interrupt. I was distracted by it. Any other questions about that, about
how we use the product or how, you know, the successes that we're having with it.
Yeah. No, it sounds great. I mean, I can dig in for half an hour about it. Why it
wasn't working before? But I don't need to. Well, then there is, there is some added,
uh, potential future capabilities too because Tyler does have a stand alone fire
module. Uh, you know, that assists in helping have recurring cases and things like
that. We don't subscribe to it now and I don't think that we're at the point where
we would need to, I'm able to do what I need to do at this point within our current
program, but it would be really nice to have that future functionality. Should we
decide to, uh, to implement that after you get your truck? And let's,
let's, uh, let's get this figured out first and then we'll expand. But uh but there
it does have that future uh capability. Thanks. Go cool. Well, I'll keep things moving.
Um So laser Fish integration is complete. Uh It does have a manual component so it's
not completely automated, but Laser Fish is basically where all the documents are
stored. Um And the next one below there is naming conventions established and adopted.
So in order for the laser fish portion to work, we had to come up with naming standards
because that api the interface for laser fish uses the naming convention to figure
out where it's going to put stuff and what type of document that is. And you can
imagine there's a lot of different
the system. Can I ask you a question on that? Is that retroactively been those conventions
been applied? Or are there still lots of orphans from before the conventions were
there? I've been working on cleaning that up right now. We've got about less than
1000 documents. So there's a, basically they go into a repository and then
there's a, an API that's manually fired off that scrapes those and puts them on uh
to laser fish. And so anything that's left in there we can look at and we wanted
it that way because I can go back and see who originated those documents or why they're
not being scraped off. And some of them are because maybe it's a new permit type
or something. And we haven't created that repository on laser fish. And some of them
are just clearly misnamed so that we can go back training opportunity for the person
who did those, you know, get them renamed and then fired off. So it's working, it's
working pretty well. There was, you know, thousands, uh, a few months ago. So, um,
we've also put in place a change management process because, um, there's lots of
people tweaking the system. And again, if it's not orchestrated and we're not following
it to the process flows that we've designed, it's just too many cooks in the kitchen
doesn't make a good meal. So change control processes and control points around that.
And then I wanted to just kind of highlight that, that, you know, the team is a lot
of change is hard in, in, in organizations. And so I do see often where, you know,
there's a real reluctance to use a new tool. That's not the case here. Everybody's
embracing it. They want to adopt it. Yes, until it's configured properly. It's not
necessarily making your job more efficient. It's probably making it a little slower
and I get that, but that's just because it's not configured properly. And so, you
know, there's, there's a little bit of pain in using it because everybody's busy
and there's a backlog and that kind of thing. But, um, and then the last one is,
uh there's a hub and it's basically like a dashboard that tells you how many inspections
are, you know, do and that kind of thing. And uh from the conversion, there was thousands
uh listed there. So it really wasn't something that was accurate and it's not 100%
accurate, but it's much better now. It's down to like, I don't know, 1000 or so.
And, and so, uh that's, that's getting much more manageable and, and now it's becoming
more uh information or more valuable to everybody because in the beginning when I
talk to everybody, like nobody trusted the data. So it's like they all had a stand
alone Excel spreadsheet, right? Where they duplicated efforts. That's great. Next
one. OK. So challenges, this is kind of uh the hurdles that I'm looking
at over the next 6 to 12 months. So um there's obviously we've had uh
turnover within the county in, in all departments, but most recently even is
it? So I believe there was four it people that I know of and Sarah has left and now
DJ has given notes. So now we're down to two and that's a critical stage or
state rather. Uh in my opinion, Sarah was taking care of the servers. So making sure
they're running every time, you know, once in a while, we didn't have to restart
processes, she was instrumental in getting them upgraded, you know, just the care
and feeding ongoing of those servers. Not to mention, you know, the workstations
and laptops and all the other technologies. So, but there is not a total loss. Um
She has a lot to learn on the payroll side, but she's gonna help implement ESS um
on the mic side for um employees to check their own time and request vacations. And
um we can get rid of uh paper pay stubs and all of that. And she's also agreed to
help um continue stewardship of the Muni Financial system and the enter gov, um,
pending the hiring of a new individual who could be trained up on what Sarah does.
Ok. And so, um, it appears to be a total loss but it isn't. And, um, we are gonna
be interviewing for a, a replacement for Sarah probably in the next week to 10 days.
She's bri, I think once you die, I think she's bri. Yeah, we all have,
um, the next one is to, uh, we need to develop new staff, training plans and training
material again. You know, I, I kind of look at the best predictor of future behavior
is fast behavior and I don't really see, I mean, I don't know if it's a COVID thing
or counting thing, but there's probably gonna continue to be turnover. So I wanna
make sure that moving forward as we're building this thing, we're building it so
we can spin folks up quickly and then if people leave, we're not losing that tribal
knowledge, you know, processes that they're involved in stuff like that. Sarah does.
I want that stuff documented so that the next person coming in has a, has a starting
point there. Um, so that's kind of those two bullets. Uh, we need to be better, uh,
change and security management. I did put change control out there. We need to get
folks using it. We need to lock down security so that, you know, not too many people
have the ability to change stuff right now in the effort of just trying to get things
going there. I think there's probably a half a dozen or more people that are listed
as super users. Um And that's too many, there's too many people to change things.
We really wanna control those changes. Um We have very limited, uh, expertise on
EPL. Scott's a self starter. He's done fabulous, but I mean, he's it. So, uh, there
are some people who have gone through the initial training but not on a high technical
level. Um We don't have a lot of uh expertise in house on laser fish. I think Scott
and DJ kind of knew the most and we're losing DJ. Dave Olson knew the most two plus
years ago DJ, uh stepped up and now we're losing the DJ. So, um, we have some complexities.
So the path that I have that like that we, that was chosen before me,
uh to work with some third parties of Laser Fish is a third party app. There's online
RME which is a uh application or uh database that um septic inspectors put their
reports in and we wanna be able to feed those in and then there's a diy septic which
enables the public to take a test and become certified to do their own septic inspections.
And, you know, managing that those are all third party applications or, or systems
that there's been an effort uh to tie those into inter gov online RME has been worked
on for over a year and it's just now showing signs of feasibility. However, it's
very fragile. If one thing changes on either side, Tyler's side or on online army,
it's not gonna work. And again, like some of the people who developed that or did
portions of the coding aren't here anymore. So I want to point that out because I
do believe that simplification would benefit us and I have some ideas on those things
and then uh limitations in the technology to support growth of the environment. So
we do have some storage limitations on the Jefferson County servers, especially with
laser fish. And then we don't have a testing environment right now. So we're using
what they call a train environment for uh EP I. So it'd be really nice to have a
train environment where we could actually do training and set up scenarios to train
people uh test uh environment for testing upgrades and things like that. And then
our production environment.
Um So customer service portal So right now, the team has agreed that we can probably
roll out by July 1, a phase one. It's very simple, but I'm hoping that maybe it
will help alleviate some of the pressure that you guys are feeling. And it's basically
gonna be just simple searches. So search by parcel number by address or using the
mapping utilities. Um I have another slide at the end of this. If we wanna go into
it just to kind of give you an idea of what needs to happen in order for that to
occur. We've got a fair bit of data clean up to do. Uh We've got to figure out a
web front end. We've gotta have uh are people gonna log in, you know, are we gonna
grant logins for folks? Um Definitely for phase two, we'll have to have logins, but
we may wanna implement that on phase one, but it, we can actually do this today.
It's not as clean as I would like. And so that's by between now and July 1st, it's
gonna, we're gonna clean it up, make it super simple uh and get the, get the basic
data out there to the public. So
I have a question. It might be the same one as you. I'm just wondering if that phase
one is going to integrate with the GIS. So if you're on GIS, you can get to this
portal and vice versa, you know, like, so you aerial do you mind coming up and using
the Mic Scott
probably just leave that chair up there. That's it.
So if you're referring to the the active link to go in and uh use the Js portal to
click on permits for that, the answer to that is yes. Um We'll uh instead of uh pointing
to the uh the custom solution that was implemented over the last 25 years, uh we'll
point into the uh the new portal um and then hopefully be able to link up the parcel
under or something like that for us to um see you get permission thereafter. That's
great. So how uh what records would be available in this phase one that are not currently
available on um the GIS system uh permits. Phase one will essentially
emulate uh what you can see in GIS currently with the older permits um which stopped
when the inner gov came. So it's only up to a certain day, right? So phase two is
to allow more um uh
where like an owner or a contractor can um uh do more things within a dialogue. Yeah,
more dialogue within the application. Uh That's what's gonna happen with days two.
But to be able to view permits and plans and um that have occurred on a parcel or
a property, you'll be able to do that in phase one next week. Ok. Yeah, phase phase
two, we're looking at, you know, intelligent forms so you can actually fill out,
you know, a request for a permit right online.
So for the record, um Yes. So we wanna have intelligent intake forms for permits
being able to pay your fees. Uh and then detailed searching with the uh attachments
and stuff. And I will at the end of this, I'll give you guys a link uh Boulder, the
City of Boulder City of Boulder, Colorado. We've looked at a lot of different sites
and that one is the one that we wanna model. It is a beautiful site. It's easy. It's
simple. You go out there, you can do searches. I'll get you guys the link to that.
Um That'll give you an idea of kind of what we're thinking would be a good solution.
OK? Next steps. Um So after having been here for what,
five months, six months, it's really started to occur to me that, you know, based
on the limited it resources, we have the limited departmental resources that we have
that really know this application in detail. Uh And also the direction that Tyler
is moving in to assess software, the service um model that uh I, I truly
believe that the county could benefit greatly by having this hosted, takes the servers,
bumps them up to the cloud, the care and feeding of those servers, the care and feeding
of the applications, the upgrades, all of that stuff goes away that will significantly
reduce the burden that's on the it staff that we don't have or that we're losing,
um, two out of three. Tyler, uh, Tyler customers are hosted right now and they've
kind of indicated that's the way they wanna go. So, I don't know, they didn't give
us a date when they weren't gonna support on site. But, you know, they want recurring
revenue. What are the arguments against it? I'm, I'm totally, and look, it, look,
it addresses so many of those challenges in Scott and I have been digging into that.
We had a call last week and we need a few more calls. Um They're, they obviously
have to limit how you access that application and how you access that data. So right
now, we can dig right into our data QL queries. Uh and they, they won't allow that.
They don't want that kind of traffic and that kind of data going back and forth.
So in order to access the data, they want you to use their API which truthfully I
think is a good thing. I would rather not have these, you know, rogue uh penetrations
into the database. I'd rather have it go through a standardized module. So, um, access
to the database is a little bit limited um
for the laser fish. Well, that's, that's another piece here. Yeah. So, uh they don't
support laser fish anymore. They stopped uh last year and they have a product called
Tyler Content Manager, which we already own and we've already been paying for And
so, you know, I'm looking at simplifying the environment, which means that we should
use more standardized applications, reduce complexity, um get it hosted, let's offload
some of the tech technical stuff that we can and it makes sense to do. And so I do
think that possibly Tyler content manager is where this data should go. That would
alleviate the issues that we have right now with a lack of uh technical knowledge
on laser fish and the storage concerns that we have with that what it takes to get
there don't have a good handle on that yet. But um and then, you know, if we can
simplify and standardize, then it's much easier for us to get some consultant help
in here, for us to bring consulting help in here. Right now. They would not know
the applications that we have and the ways that we've penetrated the enter gov database
to get data out because they're custom built. And so I, I think we really need to
bring in some consulting help because we just don't have enough staff. We, we have
Scott who's, you know, got he's wearing a million hats. So by simplifying, by looking
at potentially hosting this, I think that would put us in a position where it's much
easier to get help. Mhm So um the laser fish and then um uh the
last piece is to solicit some solutions for this online army and the Ioy Septic,
those are both things I think we really need. But again, if we look at a potentially
hosted environment and staying with standard API S to get to the data and stuff,
you know, consult with Tyler or consult with some, some Tyler uh consultants. And
we don't have to necessarily go with Tyler. There are other consultants out of there,
they know the product. Um but say, OK, now staying within this standardized simplified
environment, how do we get online army and Diy septic working for us? Because those
are two components that we need because I'm, it's hard for me to support custom programming
on something. It is just you gotta look at how you're gonna support it in the future
and I think it would be very tough. So that's good. Have you looked at other other
examples? Boulder or something? I'm sure they have, I mean, not the same as us but
I mean, how, how do other areas using EEPL integrate those third party needs of?
Yeah, we've looked a little bit, I mean, so Tyler does sell another module that could
potentially help with the ses. Of course they do. Yeah.
Um But yeah, it's on, it's on our, it's on my map in terms of things to discuss with
Tyler. We haven't, we haven't gotten to the right folks yet that can dig that deep.
So, um I'm looking at the, they've given me uh some pricing and a proposal for what
they call an investment assessment and uh until I can make sure that that's gonna
hit all the marks. Uh You know, I'm not gonna recommend it, but we're kind of going
through that because I think it would be good to have somebody come in and say, ok,
let's see where you've done things, right? And where we could do things better.
So how do we get to uh an actually adult uh
life cycle stage, obviously simplifying the environment, offload the hosting and
the maintenance of EPL document all processes. So we can spin people up and when
people leave, we don't lose that tribal knowledge. Um complete the connectivity and
the data exchange between third party applications. That's, you know, the the inga
I mean the Diy Septic laser fish on my army of finished configuring
EPL behaviors and workflows and I will get to that attachment, uh that document that
I gave you guys in just a sec because that's really focusing on that. Um ensure that
EPL produces meaningful reports right now. You'll notice on that sheet that I gave
you almost all the reporting is read. Um So we've got to get the reporting, roll
out the CS S portal, formalized training for the entire staff and new hires and build
a training database and documentation. So those two kind of go together. So the document
I si gave to you guys, I really wanted to draw some bull's eyes on target and really
look at and please. This is not a critique of either department. It's just the
reality of where the the functionality, where the use of the product is right now.
So I tried to basically on the horizontal side, just give basic functionality of
the tool. So intake, can somebody go online and say I wanna do a site development
review, you know, here's the information. Um So from intake all the way through uh
down to the bottom and then across the top, the verticals are really the permit types
or the functional types within the departments. So this is just like a stoplight.
Red's not good and green is good. And so I've worked with various folks within each
department to kind of assess this. And um obviously, you can see where the red is,
where we wanna focus. So one of the interesting things with EPL is that reporting
is kind of a nightmare. It's just not easy to get good meaningful reports out of
it. And so we need a crystal report writer. We don't have one. What do you mean by
reports? What kind of reports? Well, so a report can be a lot of things and I've
categorized three different ones on there. It could be just a letter so that we've
given a notice of violation or something like that. So, you know, that would just
be something that we want to spit out. It may just have standard language on it.
It may have a little section in it. That's free form text. But um so it can be a
letter, it could be a permit, it can be reports to say, how long did it take? The
average, you know, building permit from the time the person you know, came in? So
we complete an inspection or how long does it take to do inspection? So the time
stamps, so we can start to look at productivity. I mean, I could see eventually being
able to have some key performance indicators that we can actually tell the public.
Hey, you know, here's what we're striving for in terms of how quickly we can turn
stuff around. We can't measure any of that right now. So I don't wanna, you know,
make any promises until we can measure it. So, so reports kind of run the gamut in
terms of, you know, a single page letter or statistics on how many permits were granted
or how many of a certain type of permit or? Thank you. So
if we look at, I don't know, let's just pick environmental health. So environmental
health has done really well in their configurations. They've got a couple of folks
that went through the initial training, they are still here that have said we're
gonna learn this thing and boy, they, they, they've gotten all the little behaviors
and that kind of stuff going. So you can see like they're green there, but we have
no intake. So it's all kind of manual or it might be a form online that kind of collects
stuff, but it doesn't tie to inner gov um uh inspections. So, inspections for
CD uh D CD are doing really well. Those inspections are kind of a yes or no
for environmental health. It's not quite that simple, it's not just a yes or no.
And so we need help from Tyler or from some outside consulting to figure out how
do we, how do we do inspections when there might be like maybe or you know, more
than one, you know, black and white answers. So we're not doing any inspections there.
We got the fees processing and collection going uh for environmental health. That's
in good shape. They do have some reports and letters going out. Um And a couple of
permits being printed, no performance metrics yet. Uh We don't have calendaring and
calendar is really important when you're gonna do follow up. We want the tool to
remind you and they were using outlook and then when you guys had the outlook issue
lost all that. So now it's on a spreadsheet. So we wanna will that be part of the
hub eventually calendar? Possibly? Sure, because it should, I mean, that's gonna
be the place where you look that you want those things to remind you. Hey, you know,
it's been 30 days, we haven't had a reply back.
Uh clock stops and time stamps. So that's really for performance the hub dashboards,
uh mobility function not using that within environmental health right now. So, what
does the yellow mean? The two? Is that just halfway there or like the end is in sight?
30 seconds to go. It's not, it's not that we're speed up. It's, we're not, it's not
that we're not using it but it's not working. It's not. Yeah.
Yeah. So my goal is, is, you know, maybe in six months we do this again and you know,
let's, let's see. And, and the other thing too is if we can get some additional resources
in here, obviously, I can focus them on the red areas mostly like, you know, reporting
is, is gonna be a big one and in intake because intake is a requirement for CS S
four, not necessarily for phase one, but soon after, can I just say for the public,
we'll put this up on, on, on the agenda after the fact. So they can't see it right
now. It's very helpful. Um So uh on the D CD one, basically, you can see like,
you know, the building and it feels really taken the bull by the horns on that one.
So that's kind of reflected in the green there. Um We need to get the other areas
uh up and running with that same,
same volume.
Eight questions. Mm A million. There is one slide after this. If you wanna just,
I don't know if this is of value but uh I just put this out here. I didn't know how,
how much detail you wanna get in, but these are kind of some of the tasks for our
phase one. So we've got data to clean up, we've got inspections to clean up, define
processes of how we're gonna grant access to the system, assess the network traffic
considerations. Um
Make sure that we can block certain data. Like we don't want code cases to be view
viewable. There's certain data that we wanna make sure is not uh visible, um identify
some early adopters to the test program together. So, um you know, that's just for
the phase one. So just to give you an idea of what, what we've got to do before that.
And when you say we, it's you and Scott, basically anybody who comes in to help.
I have no problem delegating in the agenda, request commissioners. I, I um I think
in the fiscal impact section, I think I statement about additional resources might
be a request for additional resources. It might be forthcoming. It might be, it was
kind of lame. Um I should have said Robby. Yeah. No, it's is, do you know if it's
been this difficult to implement this elsewhere? I mean, we're a small jurisdiction.
I can't imagine we're that much more complex than larger jurisdictions. Well, it's
a complex app. There's no two ways about it, but because you're small doesn't, doesn't
mean that it's simple it's the same complexity.
Can I said early on a dated conversion decision, I think, added complexity that was
far beyond our ability to handle and have that? Um have we made a different decision
up front? Uh We might be in a better place, something out.
Uh Previously I worked with the City of Seattle had 10, it staff dedicated to uh
the permitting software. Um And they had like 25 different integrations uh with that.
So it is a very um complicated um process to go through this. What
we're also feeling is this is an unusual. Um although for people who haven't done
it a number of times, um it's so painful, it's painful the first time, but, you know,
I'm pretty used to it these days. So, and if you think about some names, Linda Atkins,
Deborah Murdoch, Jody Adams and, and others who were heavily invested in this implementation
left for other jurisdictions retired or what have you and, and then D CD lost what,
13 people in the span of nine months. Um So, and then the COVID pandemic didn't help.
I, I really appreciate the uh kind of the systems approach. I think that is, is manifest
in this, in this presentation. I guess my one question going back to your, you know,
evolution of, of, you know, trying to get to the adult is how as we're planning this,
do we plan the self improvement that prevents us from getting to that, you know,
dotter, old, old, uh, system that doesn't work anymore. Is there, is there a plan
that as we're doing this to make iterative improvements as we go through the years?
Right. Right. Well, like two drinks at the mercy of the company. Right. I mean, that's
the thing. How do they maintain it? I'm gonna do my best to get everybody addicted
to the documentation that's gonna be living breathing and constantly changing and
then that dictates when we make changes to the tool. So the change control process.
So there are some structural procedural things that um we will get integrated and
that, you know, will be followed here um because it's always gonna change, but very
little in comparison to what we're looking at right now, you know, there's gonna
be little tweaks, there's gonna be, you may have new governance that dictates something
and now we've got, you know, make that change in the, in, in the tool and, you know,
those types of things Scott can do, you know, he's, yeah, he won't have this mountain
of work, uh this backlog and that type of thing. But, you know, right now he's a
trainer, he's the fire putter outer, you know, he's the, the, you know, fixer, the
tweaker. I mean, it's like everything he does. He does everything. And so it's really
hard to focus on forward momentum when we're just kind of treading water, putting
fires out.
I, I will say that. Um I keep talking about people that, that have left, but the,
the folks that have remained behind and hats off to you for staying diligent and
sticking with this process. And um I think in the agenda request, I talked about
Sherry's impeccable credentials. I think you're seeing why we hired her to do this.
And then Steven Scott from Seattle um was a coup. And uh, so anyway, thanks to both
of you. Yeah, great appreciation.
So I just have um I heard a number of mentions of Tyler and so if we, if we move
more of our solutions to Tyler solutions, how is that a vulnerability? How is
dependence on one purveyor's um offerings? Have you seen that be a, I guess the question
is, have you seen that be a vulnerability in the past?
You know, if, if I didn't think Tyler was a stable company that might be a risk,
the solution they're using is Amazon web services. So like that's a solid solution,
the redundancy to back up the performance on that is that causes me no concern. Um
Tyler's growing like crazy. And so I think company stability would be the only thing
that I would think would be a concern and it's not a concern you. Yeah, 11
concern I've always had when, when you pick a solution and you invest heavily in
it, you're vulnerable to dramatic price increases. So that's about the only vulnerability
I see
to pick up the option, do what we're doing. Now, I see that as a more vulnerable
solution um than moving to a uh a company that has, you know, a solid uh
platform. But the applications on um with a lot of personnel dedicated to the
stability, um as well as being able to um provide uh other solutions um if that's
something you wanted to do and didn't have the capacity to do.
So I think Sherry mentioned doing this again. So commissioners, what do you every
three months or, you know, I don't, I don't wanna, I don't wanna create, create work,
but I, I got a lot of this. I mean, I think you, you said it was a Mio Copa and this
to me is a light at the end of the tunnel. I think it's great. So I'm, I'm really,
I feel like you tell us when it's time for us to have an update, we would love it
if the color scheme changes. Yeah, I love to see a green chart would be worth the
well, and there will be some decision points with further expenditure too. So, yeah,
yeah, rough, rough timelines right now. We're Scott and I have kind of chatted like
talk with Mark too is we wanna focus on the CS S portal because I think that's a
win we need with the public. Uh But in the meantime, we're gonna try and get
all the answers and costs and a plan for migrating to the cloud that would happen
after the CS S portal, we need to make sure that that's planned appropriately. So
we don't uh lose any functionality there. But just from a timeline, if I look at
the next couple of things is we wanna, you know, get CS S portal out there and get
some simplified website set up. Um And there's a lot of, a lot of
questions we still need answered for this. Uh How we migrate and not lose functionality
and get the data scraped off the laser fission is
do the due diligence there. No, and I would envision a workshop. Uh We're bringing
a contract to you uh because migrating to the cloud will entail additional cost and
we might want to entertain a change to the technology fee that is charged when you
apply for permits because uh um I think we have a $5 or so 5% for each permit.
And given that the cost profile of our solution is increasing, we might wanna consider
a change to that fee to help support it,
any interaction with public records that this will challenge going on the cloud.
Uh uh You should mention that because Jenny Matter did raise that issue earlier.
And um Scott and I both said that we need to investigate her concerns um to make
sure that Tyler is compliant with state uh requirements. I'm sure they are, but we
need to confirm that.
Excuse me, thinking ahead a little bit, we're just um headed down a pathway of exploring
short term rental regulation potentially and um which very well could involve a third
party um app or system too. So it's, it's just a reminder to me that we need to be
keeping in mind integration um potentially with this system. So, new way of thinking
before we take on new,
new services or lines of work to double check through that uh bill, you had mentioned
some Wild Wild Land, some sort of requirements that that this might solve too,
right? So in order to track some of this uh for the Wild and Urban Interface, as
well as some of the implementations that I'm expecting for the CWPP, this would be
really good in order to track those, you know, especially in geographic locations
and things like that. So, um again, this is not much more, you know, there might
even be funds available potentially there in the form of a grant or something like
that uh from the fire side uh to do some of those hardening projects and things like
that and they're able to record them here. So just as a potential uh down the road,
something to think about. So expansion or uh uh reinforcement of what we already
have there, you know, it could be possible and there could be some funding opportunities.
OK. Any um of our department directors wanna chime in with anything.
No, no, no need to. You've been talking about your department for a long time and
I wanted to just make a, a brief aside that some of the reporting, um, weaknesses
we currently have, but sure you put it off so well, link with some of the expectations
from our county strategic plan in terms of breathing the needle on understanding
sort of the pathway that people take in order to get their permits accomplished,
et cetera. And so, um this is not rocket science, but it's, you know, the coordinations
of making sure those um investments get actualized and we're utilizing the system
to uh fully managed sync up with quite a number of other big um sort of optics that
we have on the count. And so that's important. I don't wanna use that. It's in a
brand new strategic plan. Um Yeah, I think she's been a great investment. I know
that she's really helped our team um feel more streamlined and supported and um delegation
of tasks made a lot more sense and it's just helped um with the his history we have
preceding now. Um it's been a very large burden to, to undertake, especially with
uh mark, so applicable to help the number of folks who have done work and then need
to, to move on. So, um you know, I feel very lucky that we were able to find some
money through public health to support at least half of Scott's time and Scott has
been a major boo for us to our entire staff and his particular expertise and he's
working with here and, and also supporting our, eh, side especially. Um, so I don't
know, I don't know what that future looks like in terms of
you all getting a sense of his bandwidth is, is cut thin because he's holding a lot
of hats and he's doing a really good job. But I think you carry, you pointed out
um how that is uh huge menu of things for him to sort of be tasked with. So in
terms of supporting him to be able to do more of that more of the time, I mean, we
future conversations for sure. As far as
I'll just say, I, I disagree to me. It is like rocket science
that foreign to me actually, but I'm, I'm not the tech commissioner
by Josh Peters community development director. He stole some of my thunder there
and I was gonna say something about computer science. So I was just gonna say with
the caveat that certainly not meant as a critique of anything that happened. This
is, you know, if you know that there'd be no utility in Monday morning quarterbacking
this thing except to learn from, from decisions that we made in the past. But I guess
I would say that it seems like the way it was set up, the effort was
outlined and set for it did require a lot of staff to, from just
being computer proficient like these days to be a land use planner, you need to learn
how to operate computers and all the software that goes with it. And then certain
people develop certain specialties in that. But at least the bare bones of it, it,
it's a necessity back in the day. It wasn't right. Because what do people usually
study? Well, the actual policy members actually had to look at a site and make decisions
around the development of that site. These are just different things, different skills.
And so I think we collectively asked our staff to develop expertise essentially as
computer programmers, which is a whole another thing that's why we have people like
Scott or Sheri and her knowledge about how these things all work together. And so
now we're trying to strike the balance and we want our team to, to understand how
the tool works and to use it as best as possible. But at some point and, and we've,
of course, the only person in whose job description we actually have something about
and go EPL and learning it is airing and, you know, everybody else has sort of just
been asked to, to do that. I think they've done fairly well considering that, you
know, especially with the turnover, at least in my department, it's been a challenge.
I guess I would say that when you look at the chart or, or D CD and you see a lot
of red on the land use side, the development review side. That's because essentially
just to be clear right now with our previous tool, which I'm sure it took many years
to develop these things that we refer to as reports. It's a little confusing. It
was confusing to me too. But if you think of it as two different kinds, like there's
reporting out like extracting data and summarizing it from the system in order to
be able to talk about those benchmarks that Apple mentioned that are connected to
our comprehensive plan, our strategic plan. And also we have some requirements coming
our way through central 5290 that have to do with permit timelines. Yes, all of that,
the actual reality of that makes me nervous. But then even just figuring out how
we're doing, measuring ourselves with respect to those timelines, makes me even more
nervous because that seems to be more of a technical issue that we have to solve.
Never mind the actual issue of getting funds out the door, right? So I guess I would
say that the thing that still uh makes me nervous about this tool um is that we're
not able to press a button and produce a permit on the building permit side, we are,
which is our bread and butter and, and still having been involved early on in that
conversation and with the workflow development, leading all the way to the final
product, at least we've got that going, which is fantastic and absolutely wonderful
on the landing side for a variety of reasons. We don't have, we have not done the
reports, meaning really the templates or the forms that um that are necessary to
communicate with that system and then be able to spit something out that looks like
a permit. So we haven't done that. It's all completely manual at this point. Now,
tracking we intake and we upload information to integrate, we track it through the
process. And that means that our communications within departments, you know, especially
should be a lot better and it's computerized if you will and the dashboard functions
and all of that. But we still do a lot of manual work and then we upload the results
onto the system. And then that's how the, the, that's how we document the permit
decisions in an ideal world. Not only would we be able to press a button and spit
that permit out, but we'd be able to turn the clock on and off depending on in whose
ball the court lies, if you will uh in other, whose court the ball lies.
Sorry. Anyway. So meaning that uh you know, when we take a permit, we have a certain
amount of days to make a decision about whether the application is complete in the
first place. And then we have a certain amount of days to make a permit decision
unless we get the ball back on the other side of the court and somebody else has
to provide additional information that's necessary to make that decision. So all
of those things, we're not, we, we're having to figure out how to do, uh, interim
measures. It's almost like we're, we in that regard, we've taken a step back and
now we're, you know, trying. But I think though the good news is that once we are
able to leap forward and all the bells and whistles are turned on, uh, it's, it's
gonna be great, you know, it's, it's just a lot of work to get there and we've been
asked to stretch our boundaries while we're, we're struggling to keep up with work.
And so as, you know, we're working through that per the backlog still. So I guess
that would be my two cents about that. There are possibly some funds available through
the State Department of Commerce to help us with digitizing our current process.
But I think there's a deal that we need to sign and that in regard to the implementation
of sign bill 5290. And when I went to go look at, ok, what, what money is available,
what do we have to do? They're not even ready with that yet. So, um, it's not just
us that's behind it. It's also sticker implemented a lot, which often happens right
at the legislature. All these things are laid out and the state agencies have to
scramble to get that to in place. And then we, we find out later what we're supposed
to do and meanwhile, it's already like effective. So we have a little bit of that
struggle, I think in the permanent environment, but, but we're getting there. Thanks
Josh. That reminds me of just how important it is to keep in mind um, allocating
funding for training and, you know, potentially a selection of contractors too that,
that we have that, you know, training capability so that we're really getting staff
up to speed and, um, supporting them and the, the big transition they have to make
to, um, computer programs. Yeah.
All right. Anything else pinky? Anything you wanna add? No? Ok. I'm well, and, and
I'm glad that cherry's here. It's been, you know, it's made everything so much smoother
to be able to track and have a, you know, an, an, it perspective, um, so close, um,
and really, I think, beneficial to the whole project. Ok. Mhm. Ok. All right. Well,
more to come on giving my whole, I'm in my eighth year in this job and we've been
talking about this the whole time.
All right. Um, do you wanna try and check on anything before the lunch hour? We have
a pretty busy afternoon calendar and, and maybe I don't leave the room for a minute.
I need a quick, ok. We need a quick bio break and then we'll come back and do some
uh briefing and calendar. Ok, let's um, recess for six minutes until 1150. Great.
Thanks so much Sherry
recording in progress.
All right, I'm coming back from a quick recess and we're gonna do some briefing and
calendaring. Um How does anyone have a meeting or anything? We need to be aware of
time wise. I have a call at uh at noon then, but I can let her know. I, I have to
move it. Ok. So try to wrap up by 1215. 0, yeah, I gotta drive home. So I, I love
not being too late. Ok, we'll quickly brief in calendar or we could put one off to
the afternoon. But, um, we have a pretty full afternoon.
Um, I can go and be fairly quick. So you want me to do both or just look back first.
Let's look back first and then see how we do on timing. Sounds good. So, with you
guys on Tuesday, of course, last week, which means I missed the E DC finance meeting
and then I had, uh, multiple, uh, conflicts in the afternoon, but I chose to go to
the regular meeting of the Pud as Samantha Harper and Monty and Bob Winslow all
presented the, the sewer plan kind of really formally starting the conversation about,
hey, you guys are still up for running the sewer after we build it. And it was, you
know, very well received, very excited about the project. Of course, an excellent
presentation. Um So, yeah. No, no red flags were raised. I guess it would be my report.
Um Other been, you know, talking a lot, still, a lot of recompete working with, with
the port had a couple of meetings and with Amanda Christofferson and with Cindy Brooks,
a couple of those uh with, with you guys for the Board of Health. And I was not able
to go to the Mason's Street presentation because we had a meeting. Um Some, some
internal struggles hr struggles in, in cap right now. Um I know, I guess they're
doing the, the point in time count just internally. So there's not, they're not asking
the public, they're still reaching out to other organizations, but it's a little
bit more insular than it has been in years past. Um You know, the argument I've heard
is that often they spend a lot of time training folks how to do it and then volunteers
don't participate. I, I don't know, I always enjoyed it and, and, and got a lot out
of it, but uh I will not be doing that. I think it comes up the 25th. It's this week.
So it's Thursday, we get a week to do it. But the point in time count, annual point
in time point in time count is this week I went to my first Olympic Consortium Board
meeting. It was great. I hadn't really worked with Commissioner Garrido before, but
she seems fantastic, Randy Johnson as well and really just learned a lot about the
metrics of workforce development of. Yeah, I'm just learning right now. Um had another
school to work meeting uh with kind of associated with the intellectual and developmental
disability advisory board. Anna mck mckenry has been doing great work getting that
going. I think we have a kind of a paid for staff that will be a uh a transition
from school to work for folks with uh um intellectual or developmental disabilities.
So kind of still put the um we have like three or four meetings, kind of framing
that out with DVR and Ds HS and, and some of the organizations and that's going really
well. Where will that position live? I live in public health.
We compete meeting uh weekly recompete meeting and formed some subcommittees that
we were gonna talk about forming them based like project based, but we're doing them
more about like barriers and data and, and uh kind of larger larger silos than specific
projects. Lots of new people. We have Forks and Port Angeles and you get a 4000 in
person for Port of Port Townsend was there along with Port of Port Angeles. So expanding
that table and um we have weekly meetings with Ed A as well as with ourselves now.
So that continues to be a um good work trying to find some uh consistency as to how
we move forward on, on projects with you guys, of course, for the joint Bocc Planning
Commission meeting. I love that tradition. I, I think it's, it's really good to um
have that interface. I think they got a lot out of it too. You guys were all there,
but um that was really great and also great to be there at the relaunch of that cool
ad with you guys on Sunday in a ceremonial um uh uh representation. So, yeah, it's
a good week.
Um After our meeting on Tuesday last week, we had a um good discussion with
um some folks working in forestry in the county. Uh And Aman Amanda Christofferson
organized this round table at the Port of Scott Freeman and Mallory and other
folks who are looking at how the forestry sector can contribute in Jefferson County
can contribute to the recompete project development work that you all are doing.
So, um that was a really great conversation. Um I attended very briefly the first
half hour of the who cannot coordinating council annual meeting, just our annual
meeting portion just to be there as a, as a member and to meet David Dick in his
new role. And then I stepped away and Commissioner Dean and her assignment to that
committee carried, carried the water for our county um in the afternoon, uh Chino
empower teens coalition meeting. Um And then I had a community
foundation um strategy session on Thursday morning. And then I chatted with Commissioner
Osas about DNR forestry issues um
with Mallory uh Weinheimer, our forestry consultant to talk about her future work.
But the county um Mark and I, after my meeting with Mr Ozias, then we had our board
of Health meeting in the afternoon. Um And then I also attended the Mason Street
presentation at the Jefferson County Library. And it was very exciting that they
rolled out their first rendering of the Mason Street project. And it's just super
exciting. I've been carrying postcard around showing it to everybody. Um And I mean,
I almost everybody I encounter in Havelock who's tuned to um county work is asking
about the Mason Street project. And so it's really exciting are people generally
supportive of that level of density, which is, you know, a big increase in density
for that. There's some concern about traffic and that came up at the meeting, the
needs, there will be a traffic study. But um in those, the sycamore and that, that
kind of that area of that neighborhood, but I mean, people are supportive of habitat
and their proposal for sure. Um And then Friday attended the Cannabis Education
Summit at Fort Warden um that was organized by pub our Public Health. And um
I feel like it was great to be in that room with that mix of people and I feel like
I left with more questions than I arrived with, I think. So, um I just look forward
to continuing that conversation, but it was a really great um mix of folks in the
room together and the conversations that happened around our tables were really good.
I felt like um and then I stepped away from that to
let's see, what was this one? Oh Counting coordinations. I came back and um did county
coordinations with the team here and briefly, I was briefly there and gave a bit
of a strategic plan implementation update, talking about the fact that Mark and I
are looking at bringing on Barry Dunn to do some of the implementation facilitation.
And also I um pitched the idea to the team about folks um owning
objectives in the plan. And as it was mentioned earlier today, there are many objectives
in the plan that are just very logically aligned with work our departments are doing.
So just assigning the, you know, the ownership of the reporting back on those and,
and building a mechanism so that there's common reports coming back on the objectives
um or is work that Mark and I will do together towards that with Barry Dunn. But
Barry Dunn did give us a proposal for implementation and Mark and I felt like it
was maybe a little big and so we're talking about how to scale that back. Yeah, but
one thing that they proposed was a dashboard implementation dashboard and we think
that that could be really useful. So and then I ran to KPTZ and was on KPTZ with
um Steve Shively and Marsha Nas NASI, talking about the Olympic Peninsula tourism
strategic plan that we just completed and kind of just uh the conversation around
tourism and coming out of COVID time and kind of the different kinds of tourism we've
seen as a result of COVID and the the over loving of our natural areas. So it was
a, it was a great conversation and I feel like another solid KPTZ show. So then I
of course, was with you guys um for the, the OCC and Planning Commission retreat,
which I thought was great. And yeah, I think especially as we move through this periodic
update process, it will be good to have, you know, regular meetings with the Planning
Commission and keep the conversation going.
Ok? Um Let's see, my week last week um with you all on
Tuesday, Wednesday, um did some planning work with the uh Climate Action
Executive Committee. So I think I told you we'll be coming forward with some few
things we need to think about our county goals for adaptation and mitigation. It's
that time mark. I don't know if you heard that warning, but like we got to start
working for a workshop and Carly did we talk about the fifth? That's for climate
sequestration different. Those are slightly different. Yeah, this
our, it would be nice to get our start working on our goals before that workshop.
Um So we can do our goals separately. But then, yeah, Climate Action Committee wants
to come and do a workshop with us on um sequestration for Sequestration Goals. That
was February 5th at 1015 on that one. Ok. So do you mind emailing me that just so
I can loop uh the Climate Action Committee in? Ok. Thank you. Um
Hey, was that, did you say February 5th or March 5th February 5th at 10:15 a.m. And
we can move that. But I didn't, I ask for late February after the 23rd. I, I not
remember but I think I put in the email that I can check. That's too soon. We can
do it. It might be because is going on vacation. I knew you had a couple of meetings
where you were out of the loop. Are you thinking you wanna push it to a um beginning
of March? I, I'll have to look at the email I sent to give to. It's hard to tell
from my phone. Um So our goal is uh the
forest and trees inventory or work group has come up with some sequestration goals
for us to consider and.
Oh, and a new um uh emissions goal more aligned with current IPCC
projections. Uh So those three topics more to come, but we should start thinking
about how we wanna handle county uh mission and um adaptation goals. If that's something
we wanna, you know, identify a champion in each department who does that um sort
of had a formal process for it. And so each time it feels a little ad hoc and, and
um a little more organized and come up with better goals and better. Totally agree.
Yeah. So let's find a time to talk about that. Also, trees aren't the only thing.
Of course, that's a question. Yes, it is what we have data on from the um uh software
program that was used to do this for and inventory. Yeah. So um section
no or um you know, building material types that sequester. So, yeah, they, they know
that it's an imperfect sequestration, incomplete um segmentation scenario.
Um I went to Olympia in the dumping snow on Wednesday and it was fine. That was,
it was, the roads are actually fine. So, um but I was nervous, it didn't turn out
to be a big deal I met with our lobbyist and, um, she, I think it sounds like, you
know, since we didn't really come up with a, a priority legislative agenda then she's
interested in creating kind of a, a hot sheet of, you know, the, the bills that are
most important to us that she can help us track and be reactive instead of proactive.
Yeah. Yeah. Um, so that's something we should give some thought to if there's certain
bills you want her to track. Um Let me know and um we'll add those list. I was thinking,
I just got an email today about the school based health clinic, uh capital budget
request we have at that we have her be be working on that a little bit down there
too. I'll ask public health before I do that.
Um
I always know that I'm taking too long when I my phone closes in between um topics
uh hooking up coordinating council meeting Wednesday afternoon. Um And like he, he
said, new executive director, his first meeting, we were doing strategic planning
uh which is going well, that organization has had some existential uncertainty and
um but I'm excited that that David Dix, the new director really seems to share my,
my vision which is really, you know, get some successes. The coordinating council
is unique. It's uh you know, we don't set out another entity that is a council of
governments with tribes. Um You know, about to delist, the first salmon species ever
been done in this country. Like there's some, some successes there. And um, so I
think he's the right person and hopefully with some of those successes in raising
the profile, be able to get more secure funding sources to continue that work. Um
Definitely in the, the uh time frame where I'm often in two meetings at once, having
a legislative hearing going on, waiting to testify and those are just taking forever.
So I had that happened a few times last week, um, including all Thursday evening,
which is very frustrating hours and hours listening to this hearing, not knowing
when you don't know when your bill is gonna come up and you don't know when your
name is gonna get called. I mean, it's just, I don't know how people tolerate it.
I do it a few a week and I wanna pull my hair out. Um, uh, most of Thursday spent
with Association of Counties Legislative steering committee, a few things to report
there, um, was a, is still in support of removal of the 1% cap for property tax.
Um, and there's a lot of controversy within the organization. Um, even though they
have had that position since that 1% cap was put in place in 2007. Um, so I, I testified
in favor of a bill to remove that cap, um, representing, uh, was a, um, and it might,
it might actually move this year. So that's removing that cap, putting a cap at,
um, uh, in inflation or um, growth
rates neither to exceed 3%. Can I ask you a similar bill that cessor Chapman mentioned?
I was just really curious about this homestead exemption bill. Do you know anything
about that one? Um II I missed so I wasn't here. I kind of coordinate. We did discuss
all of the exemption bills at was a, um, because there were like seven or eight exemption
bills. Um, and Wack took a position to oppose all of them simply because they affect
our revenues across the board. Yeah. And that doesn't mean that, you know, a county
couldn't choose. They're suggesting that all of those bills have language that either
removes the county portion of the exemption of tax. Just state. Yeah. So state vote
on your own portion, not on ours and allow counties to adopt that exemption if they
want to. Um, so that's when we actually voted and landed on that, um, position. So
I, um, I could get, I could find that bill number if it would be helpful. It's probably
here. I'd just be curious, tracking it as it goes through. Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting.
Yeah. And there's, I mean, it's tricky because some of the exemptions are, you know,
removing, um, sales tax for affordable housing projects which we want to incentivize
affordable housing projects and that revenue is important to us. Same with, um, uh,
salmon enhancement recovery projects. Those are, you know, it's, it's a tough one.
Yeah, it's tough but maybe having the tool in our toolbox so we could use, it, want
to create incentives would be helpful but not across the board but be interesting
to know how much revenue those actually um generate counting. Yeah. No, what we're
actually talking about. Yeah. And something I was a little uncomfortable with is
I didn't see any safeguards in any of those bills for how everything just says you,
you know, if somebody has a copy of a certificate from a nonprofit they can go buy,
especially the affordable housing. One is furnishings, decorations. Like you could
buy anything with a certificate and not pay sales tax. I just think how is your art
from? Exactly. And it, it seemed a little unhinged.
Put some guardrails in no protection from abuse. It makes me think I digress. I will
not even go there. Mhm. Things did get spicy talking about a bill which, um, uh,
transitions, uh, small gas powered engines, uh, to electrical,
uh, right now generators and chainsaws are exempt trying to get it. Emergency, you
know, needs for emergency might not be power and for rural communities. Um, and so
we'll be taking that up next week at Mossack and a lot of people really don't like
that idea. So, leaf blowers. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And it's interesting people are
arguing that the equity side both ways that, you know, there's a lot of businesses
or small governments that can't afford to make that transition only it's many year
runway to get there. Um And then other people saying, well, the people who are using
that kind of equipment, day in day out are usually, um, you know, people who are
economically distressed and they're having, they're absorbing the health impacts
most of the um exposure to uh largely, you know, three strike engines and things
that are the dirtiest burning engines and they're in very close proximity to. So
a lot of passionate opinions on all sides of that too, of course, um
went to the habitat open house while in a hearing. It's a little distracted um
but great, uh great to see the initial draft of the master plan and um but it's being
well received. It was a pretty big apartment building which I was, I was a little
surprised, but they seem to have been thoughtful about how it was a great parking
and maintain open space and trails and um leaving a big green green space section
of green space in the forest there and
uh attended the Cannabis Summit Friday morning for the first hour and a half or so.
Um My takeaway was just that the assumptions that we make about
marijuana are based on the potency of marijuana. When those of us sitting in policy
making seats were um experimenting as teens and that it's a very different product
now. And that um we need to better understand impacts to developing brains with super
high potency. So, and the methods of delivery too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, very different.
Um Then went into a meeting, the Puget, a regional council brought together all of
the ferry communities um for a meeting and uh Washington State Fairies were
there, but it was, it was great to just commiserate with elected from all over the
region. Interesting. The only jurisdictions not represented were King County and
Seattle, which apparently, and some people are saying is that why we have a hard
time getting various funded, but apparently they, Seattle and King County never engage
in those conversations. And that's where so many legislators are who vote on the
budget. Um So that was helpful to identify that um very seem to, I
don't know, iii I feel like they have generally been sympathetic and making efforts
to meet extraordinary challenges um and been willing to address those and admit to
those challenges. You know, we are still the lowest priority run will not get a second
vote back for years and years if ever. Um And I've been surprised our business community
hasn't been more vocal about that, but they seem to have adapted to that new reality.
Um But uh since like Saidi Castle will keep commuting these quarterly or a couple
of times a year and it was, it was valuable to be there. We did get um in running
through the counties and introductions. Jefferson County was left off and say, excuse
me, excuse me,
um join the coordinating meeting late because I was the only person from uh well,
Ben Thomas did join the ferry community meeting a little later. Um But I, I didn't
like being the only Jefferson person, so I stayed there a little longer. Um A number
of interesting uh conversations about shellfish all weekend, which was great. Um
Enjoyed the Planning Commission. The OEC joint retreat could attack land use all
day long. And, um, yeah, hopefully it's helpful to have commissioners interested
in that topic. Um Then I enjoyed the collab relaunch also, both of you. So
it's after 1215. Should we do calendaring after lunch? We can, I can wait for March
last week. Yeah, I don't have a lot to report really for, uh, last week. First Monday
was a holiday, Tuesday, the 4/17
had lunch with, uh, David Timmons and we had an interesting conversation about the
aquatic center and about the PD effort that was mounted a number of years ago and
he has ideas about, uh, creating a facilities district that I'm intrigued by and
I asked him to share that work and he will, um, and I'll be talking to you about
that before the next steering committee meeting because we might wanna put a proposal
out. It differs from, um, what we've been talking about thus far and then a couple
of meetings with staff. Um and then Thursday um really good meeting with Mallory
and I think we did get an updated statement of work and so I can bring a contract
to the board on the fifth of February. And that was Sarah to talk about a work plan
briefing this afternoon and then had the, the meeting with it, staff to talk about
staffing and uh recruitment and, and other issues that they're facing currently and
then Friday or yeah, Friday. I was off to have this done so quick report on last
week. Ok. All right. Um We wanna uh, recess. Ok. Ok. We're gonna
recess to lunch until 131 later. Ok. Thanks guys. Good morning. I'll wait until you
guys continue recording in progress. All right. You want me to go to his Zoom link
now? She misused it.
You have the thing that you got, you got it. I do and I'm there now,
everyone. We are coming back into session from our lunch recess and we are going
right into executive session with the county administrator, chief, civil deputy prosecuting
attorney. And the board regarding potential litigation exemption is outlined in the
open Public Meetings Act, RCW 42.30 0.1 10 parentheses. One parentheses. I uh we
are going in for 30 minutes from 130 until 2 p.m.
calendar.
Ok. I can just do it on the camera and um uh we may take potential action.
We may take action following in which case we do, we will take public comments. We'll
be in until two o'clock. All right, thank you. Ok, we can just right. Um Let's see,
Greg, are you back with us?
Can you promote me Carolyn, please? We are coming back into session. It'll just be
good to get a sound check. Anybody online tell me if they're able to hear me.
I mean, it appears that we are. Ok. A B and, and it's uh closed cap. She is picking
up all your words, so. Oh, great.
Mm All right. We are coming back from executive session and we are not taking any
action. Um Next up, we have a workshop on the 2024 human resources work plan. So
Sarah and Mark, I'm not sure who's Yeah, this, this bandage on, I can't double
click. Oh, are you supposed to be using your hand that much more? Yeah. What about
your left hand? You, have you seen me with my left hand any time recently?
Ok. And Greg, are you hearing us? All right.
Yeah, that's
here we go. He's there twice now. Um My phone maybe. All
right. Ok. Are you ready? Yes. Ok. Um Good afternoon. Thank you for this opportunity
to talk about um human resources for 2024. Uh This is a plan, an overarching
plan and um as other things arise during the year, um we will probably be working
on other things as well. So
um OK, we can click. Yes, county uh county employees are here to provide critical
services to everyone in our community. We do all the jobs that are listed here and
more and all of this is done in alignment with federal state and local regulations
as well as with Jefferson County's values and strategic priorities.
OK.
Human resources role is to support all our employees in their important work and
to provide strategic leadership and recruitment, retention, compensation, organizational
effectiveness, employee relations, labor relations, leave management and employment
law and compliance. Here's a list that is representative of what we do, but it's
not all inclusive. Hr leadership is essential for organizational integrity and for
assisting the county, assisting the county and reaching strategic goals and priorities.
Ok?
Um I think he went, yeah, that's where we are. So currently the county has approximately
339 employees. In 2023. We had 87 new hires and
71 separations
that can and separations are due to many things post pandemic, uh changes in
social ideas. Um Some people wanted more money um but
mostly uh feedback that I received was that there's change in family life or desire
to do something different.
In 2023 we also uh negotiated um two union contracts uh
for the first time. Those are ratified by the bargaining unit members and adopted
by the board of county commissioners.
Um We facilitated updating a travel policy which included a team um across departments
as well as department leaders, which was really a great way to get everyone together
and get everyone's input on the travel policy since it touches every department.
And we co-ordinated a mandatory training initiative toward the end of 2023 which
increased our completion of mandatory trainings by about 30%. So these trainings
are defensive driving, um anti harassment diversity, um network,
um security um laws regarding um their records act.
And so, um and these are involved for required for every employee and it's about
depending on what the employee's job is. It can be from anywhere from 6 to 8 hours
of training. Ok.
So
um also initiated in 2023 toward the end of 2023 is our ongoing plan
to increase mental health awareness in Jefferson County. And this includes continuing
to communicate mental health resources such as the employee assistance program, its
accessibility to staff, encouraging employees to reach out when in need and normalizing
conversations about mental health awareness. Increased training will also be folded
in to our strategic plan initiatives and training of supervisors and managers. So
here are items on the work plan for 2024 are recruiting and training new uh new human
resource analyst too, initiating and completing collective bargaining for five contracts,
initiating and implementing a strategic plan, completing updates to the personnel
administration manual and conducting an exempt employee comparable pay analysis.
OK. Um Human resources also has a really big role in the strategic plan
initiatives that were developed over the last year. And these are mainly centered
or mostly centered on, you know, um providing training and salaries and
other opportunities for our employees to feel um welcome here and to want to stay
here. Um As I mentioned earlier, we are planning to develop a training program focused
on managers and supervisors are there as they are the front line and um working with
and speaking with our employees,
other initiatives you see here are developing and implementing an employee recognition
program, enhancing employee engagement and prioritizing programs to identify needed
staffing and provide critical, essential or enhanced services.
And then um the last item is any questions?
Thank you, sir. When you said that the trainings had gone up by 30% was that the
um the effort that Aaron was leading to remind us all that, you know, these are the
trainings, this is where you're at in your training schedule. Ok. Yeah, it was really,
yeah, when we did a specific engagement with employees, one on one, it really increased
the response. Yes, I sad to say was one of the folks that hadn't done any of the
training in the previous couple of years. And so over the course of, you know, once
I was notified over the next two weeks, I completed um all of the required training
and Heidi, I think you spent a couple of days doing the same thing. So, um yeah,
we just need to, I, I mean, that's a, a risk reduction strategy because if, you know,
if we have a lawsuit involving one of those areas and it's clear that we hadn't trained
our employees, then our risk goes up. It's also an opportunity to continue to develop
our culture here and, and ensure that all our people are on the same page, which
is, you know, let's be careful driving when we're out there on the roads. Um anti
harassment is not, is something really important here. We don't tolerate harassment,
the importance of diversity in our workplace. The importance of ensuring that our
uh our computers are um safe from interference. And I hear
a lot from people, you know, kind of laughing about the network security trainings.
I don't know if y'all have taken them but they're great because they help with home
life too. It doesn't just happen here,
Greg any questions from you or comments. Uh No, no questions, great presentation.
It's great to see hr kind of, you know, stretching its wings and, and growing to
really, I'd say embrace the, the, the staff of the county. So good work. I, I enjoyed
it. I guess my one criticism is lots of pictures of the uh staff, but I didn't see
any pictures of our growing hr department there.
We tend to be photos shy in our group but good stuff, sir. Thank you. Um You've
not announced that you filled the new position, but how is that going? We are uh
interviewing right now, have a third interview this afternoon, so I hope to have
a candidate by the end of the week. Ok. And just as a reminder that serves all departments
in the,
um I'm wondering, we have some staff here. Are you guys interested in weighing in
on this topic?
You'd have to speak into the microphone today if you wanna speak Renee, you as well.
Uh Yeah, I'm I'm just interested in um you know, the um how the health and safety
component of hr I didn't see that um rise to the level that I
thought maybe it would for 2024 based on um you know, Chris's death
and having a severe mental health issue um that I would hope that there would be
a lot of energy um into establishing a formal
program policy, procedure guidelines, something to get the newest and most up to
date resources to do an assessment of what we could have done better and how this
never happens again for other employees. Um That's my area concern,
sir. Do you know how, how other organizations are, are handling it? It's, it's such
a a sensitive issue because it's, you know, we largely think of it as private and
so much of mental health is like other healthcare very protected in the in the workplace.
And yet, you know, we want a culture where it is safe to be struggling and to ask
for help and have you kind of followed where the latest research is on how organizations
are effectively supporting people's mental health. Yeah. Um what I've found in, in
my research or studies and, and actually in the county, we've approached it in a
more quiet way because of the challenge of the situation we had at the end of last
year and what we did and what is at the top of
importance for other jurisdictions, private companies is to have conversations with
employees to normalize conversations about mental health, which includes just saying,
hey, if you're feeling stressed or anxious or you have issues at home, uh call
your EAP another huge uh area where there can be impact is if supervisor or managers
are, are vulnerable with their employees and say, even if they come in every day
and say, hey, this is how I'm feeling today. And if we can do that, then our employees
can say, hey, this is how I'm feeling today. So, um these feelings are important
because once we get it out there, we acknowledge them and respect them, but we can
then also get on to do our work. And if we can't do the work, then have it be ok
for someone to take the day off or just have PTO and just say I, I need the day off
today. Those are really big things. Having a EAP program is a huge um is also a
huge ability for each or necessity now, for employers. I actually, there was just
a recent um article that just came out, I believe, I read it in the New York Times
and it was a study, it was done in England. And the results of that study showed
that increased mental he mental health awareness didn't really change any of the
outcomes in the businesses that they saw. What was really important was that
on each side that the, the people reached out for help
and it's that balance of providing um all the resources we have and the,
the normalization of it and, and just having to be ok, which is what we are working
on and that right to privacy and the
communication um with the employee about their needs.
I'm sorry. Oh, great. Thank you. Um It will bring you over Apple.
I'd be curious too if you have any ideas, Jenny. Um and we have some time we have
till 230. So um hi Apple. Y long time. No, see, thank you. Um
I'm just, I'm sitting in here watching um I have one of these uh work plan sharing
to do in February. So thank you, Sarah for um your great presentation. I love how
you always go first of all the departments. So ha um I just want to chime in about
um Jenny's comments and just um workforce mental health in general. And I can only
speak from my personal experience here in leadership at public health and all of
the sort of behavioral health type reach that we do in terms of um the grants and
the uh the funding we provide and the connections and collaborations with our community
partners around the well being of citizens, especially with uh mental and behavioral
health issues. And obviously, we're not exempt from that as staff. Um And it's very
close to home for lots of us um whether that's losing someone to suicide, which um
we all have some proximity to in one way or another probably or drug use. Um And
then general mental health with regard to work life balance and living through the
pandemic and all the stressors of the service oriented work that we all do in the
county is just a lot. Um I wanna just offer sort of the, the notion that um
I personally, and along with my management team, we are working on strategies for
workforce development within public health that I think can ripple in other ways.
And so I'm simply offering some ideas, they're not even suggestions, they're just
uh food for thought. Um I was able to get a workforce development grant uh for our
staff and I'm looking into and having discussions with our local Behavioral health
entity um about having them come and do a mental health first aid training to our
staff and I know that there's um interest kind of across the board for many folks
in that sort of training. The mental health first aid concept is sort of a trademark
curriculum um that has been offered in our, in the peninsula at other times for a
full day workshops for the public. And they are, I think generally free. Um I have
some funding to, to pay for them to come and do a special version of it for our staff
in a more condensed way, not only to um enliven and
support uh the way that we mentally hold the whole health of people with regard to
our public health service work, but just how we um engage the public and how they
come to us with their variable needs, whether it's folks at the courthouse, um coming
to get, you know, the license renewal or whether it's people coming into our clinic,
um needing some uh tending and some care uh with where they're at relative to whatever
appointment they're coming in for to see our clinicians. So, um I don't, I'm not,
I'm gonna speak for Jenny, but I think she did bring it up and I was just feeling
um compelled to share that. It's certainly not lost on me that mental health is,
um, is very vulnerable even of our workforce. And, um, I think
Sarah has ideas and certainly passion around being sure that our staff as who as
a whole are supported and hopefully can feel safe in their work environments to um
to talk with their supervisor or to maybe get some special accommodations if that's
necessary, if something is happening. Um I know those types of things come across
my desk all the time. Um I would also just say that in terms of risk reduction for
our whole, you know, 300 plus staff and seeing that the number of separations in
um Sarah's first slide, it's high. But also our recruitment has been high too, uh
which is good, but separations can happen for a number of reasons as Sarah pointed
out and probably in some cases, they had to do with some folks who are really struggling
with the balance of this stressful work and life and the stress of the pandemic and
financial concerns, et cetera. Um I know from our COVID after action report here
internally in public health where we had so much to do in the pandemic that there
was a lot of indices around indices around. Um just staff feeling it difficult to
feel supported with the the great body of work. They were being um sort of thrust
at them constantly. Um And had I been able to be even more nimble in the pandemic,
it would have been nice to have some workforce development funds at my leisure over
and above what's basic in order to kind of, you know, have extra access for therapeutic
models for our staff during that time, they might have resisted it at the moment
because they felt like they had no space other than to just, you know, approach COVID
head on and do nothing but that. So hindsight is 2020. But um I do feel like it might
be going out on a limb, but really prioritizing access, whatever that means, whether
it's cohesive sort of staff training around mental health disorders and how to identify
um, indicators of suicidal ideations. I mean, this is in my wheelhouse, I'm a nurse
and I have engaged in this with human beings often before I was doing this work.
So I understand what those uh indicators are, but that doesn't mean that I can expect
that my colleagues also um have that experience or even if they are aware and have
learned that they feel compelled and empowered to really watch out for everybody
in a way that is sometimes has to be super courageous because it's not like in the,
it's not in the norm, it's not in the channel to speak out and say I'm worried about
this person, this something has to happen that's different than happening now. And
of course, there is definitely confidentiality and privacy but where we can cohesively
like collectively learn about tending to one another's mental health in the workplace.
We're all served by that at every level. Mhm
Thank you, Apple, I really appreciate um what you've said and, and would love to
take you up on any kind of training that we could provide here for our, all of our
staff and our um mid managers as managers as well. I, I think the more we talk about
it and learn about it, the better it is for everyone um and helping them to feel
also safe in our environment here at work. Um Also, I appreciate um Jenny you coming
and speaking up today and asking the question. Um I'd like to sit down with you and
maybe any folks in your department who would like to talk about next step that you
would like to go forward um are ways that I can assist in that or any ideas you might
have um would be welcome from me. Do you have any specific ideas, Jenny for the
types of um I don't know, work or trainings that we could be considering,
I'm more on the of developing the plan. Like I really feel strongly that there should
be a, you know, a, a detailed plan and something where um you know, we could develop
a policy and we could provide training based on that policy. We could look at other
organizations and see what are the best mental health practices. I mean, the number
when I looked did the initial um research review or literacy review through the who
the number one factor was leadership in people's how that affects your mental health
and look at those factors. Um you know, come up, make this, not something that's
just a training of Sprinkle here and a Sprinkle there but something that, that represents
how enormous it is in all of our life, I think, um, all together. I mean, I think
it's, um, you know, I think there's a lot that can, uh, that, you know, some things
are not, if they're not addressed, they're sort of encouraged unless they're really
called out. Like, you know, what is it perpetuated through inaction? Um So I, I guess,
yeah, what I'm saying is that it would, I would like to have like a formal evaluation,
some kind of formal evaluation or documentation about this is what makes this best
practice for this particular entity and this is what we're gonna take from that and
this is the steps we're gonna measure that going forward. Um And, and something that's
gonna maybe cost some money and some energy because it needs, it's worth it. Mhm
That's, and I am very willing to participate and um support or whatever. I, I just
don't, I just don't um want it to be sort of lost.
I wonder if there's a, a opportunity for a, a subcomittee to come together and, you
know, kind of think about how we might proceed. I don't know, sir, if you, I'm, I'm
trying to not put something more on H R's plate exclusively. Um um I do feel
like this is asking for some kind of committee that can work together, I will add
it to the plan. Um, it will of course, impact my, uh, the
plan for hr, for this year. And that's ok. Um, for, because it's for a really important
reason. So, um, I'll work with Mark and perhaps even you, if that's, you know, maybe
perhaps we can get a commissioner on, on, on a committee to do a review and determine
what next steps we could take.
What do you think? Commissioners? I think it's good. And I think one thing I was
gonna say is I feel like a lot of it is about being seen and heard. And um in my
last role in my last job, we made a real big effort to at department levels and then
as a whole organization level, um institutes and practices where we were checking
in with each other frequently through huddles. And I mean, it's sounds, some of these
things sound like silly tools or basic tools, but they really work because it's about
getting normalizing communication and seeing each other. Um, and hearing. So
I, I think that it doesn't have to be, it's not rocket science in a lot of ways,
but it would be good to have a plan and have people buy into the plan and then implement
the plan which are all big lifts, right? But still important work.
Craig, do you have any thoughts? I, I think that the course outlined here sounds,
sounds great. You know, it's a, it's, it's a way that we can improve. I think Jenny
is right that it is, is definitely a leadership component. So, you know, the more
training that we can bring partner with public health, I think it sounds yeah happy
to serve or, or, you know, have a commissioner serve on, on this subcomittee or committee
that is to uh you know, figure out how can we improve the system to, to support our
staff? Absolutely worthwhile.
Apple, would you or someone from um, pub public Health have the capacity to help
in a, a subcomittee? Um I would personally, um, and I certainly can
once we have our sort of departmental training, at least in this one instance. And
again, Jenny said it clearly, it's like it has to be sprinkled throughout. And again,
this is just my initial uh little dunk here with the funding that I have before that
funding runs out. Um I'd be happy to, you know, recruit sort of a, a survey
of our staff in terms of what it meant for them and then where they feel it's heading
for them, maybe as a template for what this other committee might do on a grander
scale uh for the county, whatever that may be. I mean, I'm, I'm happy to help lend
insight, not only to a committee but through my own um application of the intervention
here. Great. I'm aware that we have a number of guests from um, DNR joining us for
our 230. So, um I really appreciate Jenny and Renee bringing this issue forward.
Really appreciate Sarah's great report. Um Sir, if you're, are you comfortable kind
of convening um some discussions on this topic? Yeah, I'll lead the way on that and
gather together a group and, and begin. Great. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks everyone.
All right.
Ok. So we have a 230 discussion with pertinent measure resources. So Caroline, you're
bringing folks over? Yeah, I'm seeing Dwayne from Dwayne Emmons from DNR. Um
Ogden, are we expecting? I'm looking at the Zoo Prime. I I need to be brought out
here as a Panelist but then
there on here. Ok. Let's see. Do you see the other g uh I think that's it but looking
right now,
uh
Dwayne or Sarah Sarah or Dune, are we bringing over Bill Wells too as well?
Is he with you guys? I'm, I'm not 100% sure if, if he's in the room, it probably
is a good idea to bring him over just in case you have questions about potential
parcels. Ok. I think that's it on the list. Um And so do you
want me to tee this one up? So we are um following up on a letter that we received
last month, I think it was on the 18th of December from DNR saying you win the lottery,
you get, you get some acres in your county of this natural climate solutions, structurally
complex forest allocation that DNR has been working to um identify acres in a number
of counties. And we were asked to provide con concurrence by the end of this month.
So by next week, basically, um and um I've had a lot of conversations about not only
the acres that have been suggested for Jefferson County, but as you can imagine,
I've talked with a number of other counties. So I wanted to hear, um, I wanted for
all of us to hear from DNR as to the their recommendation for Jefferson County and
then I have a couple of questions following that um presentation that I think Dwayne
was gonna do for us. Right? Was that right? Yeah, that, that sounds good
to me. Ok. Um And I don't know if you have the presentation uh that we put
together if you would like me to share my screen with the presentation, I think.
Do you have it Caroline? I think we have, we don't have a power in our pack. It,
it, it, it sounds like it would be great if you could share your screen. Ok. I will
do that. I think you did send it to me, but, all right, I'll, I'll do
that.
All right. So I'm hoping you're all seeing my screen and it has the identification
of 2000 acres on it. Um So, yeah, and again for the record, uh commissioners, uh
I'm Dune Emmons. I'm the assistant deputy supervisor for State Uplands. Um I'm sorry,
I'm not able to be there in person. They keep me fairly close to the legislative
building this time of the year. Um And so, um, what I do want to do is this is a
very uh short uh powerpoint that has maps that you've seen already. Um But I just
wanted to walk through the, these couple of slides and then would be happy to answer
questions. So, as you know, the legislature, uh, last session in a budget provider
proviso provided $70 million for the department to do two things. Um, first
was identify up to 2000 acres of carbon dense, structurally complex forest uh throughout
western Washington, um, that the department would be able to move into conservation
status or it says move out of trust status. Um And uh, after that work was done,
uh, we would have to, to buy land, um, to make sure that we keep the trust whole.
And so technically, the first step is we have to buy land. Um, and then we can move
up to 2000 acres out of trust status. And then any remaining land, uh would be, um
dedicated to encumbered lands, counties. And that includes, uh Wai Scania
Pacific, Clallam and Jefferson counties. And so, uh, that $70 million would go to
buy land and then it would be used for those two different purposes in that proviso.
We were also required to present to the Board of Natural Resources by the end of
the calendar year, uh the 2000 acres that we were proposing to set aside, um
along with that the counties uh where we do identify that land have to concur. And
that's regardless of whether that's county trust land that benefits the county and
the junior taxing districts or common school university trust any trust. Um And that
was uh put into the proviso ignition that there are counties that are very resource
dependent and uh a lot of the economic activity from the county comes from the management
of forest land. So setting aside land, you know, in a county that is really dependent
on that would supply is very impactful. So the legislature, you know, provided that
the county would be able to have that concurrence regardless of trust. Normally,
you know, a a county can obviously um you know, comment and, and have discussions
with the department about management of any trust but decisions on individual trusts,
you know, that aren't, aren't county trust. Um This is a unique uh situation in the
proviso. Um And the, the letter that we uh sent did request that we uh get concurrence
by the end of the year because we need to know which trusts and where we want to
buy land. Um And so it's easier when we know which trust we're buying that land for.
So getting that concurrence helps us with that next stage. In the work. Um Should
we go back? Um As we set about doing that, work on identifying the 2000 acres. Um
We worked with conservation organizations and we agreed on a definition of uh carbon
dense and structurally complex. Um The department has existing definitions for are
different stages of maturation. Um So, maturity of forest stands and this is something
that we've had uh for uh over almost 20 years. Um As you
know, we have an old growth policy where any old growth uh as defined by this uh
uh guide and by our old growth policy is conserved wherever we find it, if we're,
and when we're laying out a timber sale and our field staff identify old growth,
it gets conserved. Um And so some of the guides that we developed to help our staff
identify with growth have those definitions of maturation, one maturation, two, et
cetera, and we have a field guide uh that staff use for that. And so we uh we agreed
that anything that was in that maturation, one stage and greater, more complex, we
would consider part of that structurally complex. Um Our uh staff scientists gave
us some, some working um definitions or uh ways to query in our um in our gis data
carbon debts. And so using both of those factors um allowed us to, to
do a remote search of our, our land base to identify these areas. Um One of the other
things that uh Commissioner Franz asked us to do was because we're spending $70 million
of Climate Commitment Act funding, we want to get the most co benefits possible.
Um And so she asked us to identify areas that were also adjacent to existing habitat
in areas that would improve connectivity between habitat and then avoiding just those
small isolated pockets across the land base. Um because the intent is to move these
out of trust status and and into our Natural Areas program. Um having our Natural
Areas program which is chronically underfunded. Now, being responsible for, you know,
10 acres here and five acres there and four acres there would also cause just operational
challenges for that program. So, trying to identify areas that were nearby existing
uh natural areas uh was also preferable.
So because these are going to be set aside in conservation in perpetuity, we also
wanted to make sure these were durable. Um If you look on the screen over on the,
the far left hand side, clearly not old growth. This is a second growth forest, but
that may be carbon depth if you've got a lot of uh standing timber and you know,
uh fairly uh dense stand that can be carbon depth, but it's not going to meet that
structural complexity component. On the other side, clearly old grow, it's carbon
dense and structurally complex, but it's already conserved under our policies. So
we're looking for that in between that maturing stand that maturation one up through
that multi cohort stain.
Yep. So um methodology and this again, remote screening. Um uh
Doctor Donato gave us some metrics to look at. One was having at least 60 metric
tons of live carbon per acre. And then meeting some of these other criteria having
at least 1.8 modeled canopy layers. So getting multiple kind of canopy levels, a
quadratic mean diameter of at least 17 inches of the largest 100 trees. So that weights
more of the, the trees in the larger uh size class and then having at least 12 trees
per acre that are 30 inches and larger. So again, having larger trees scattered throughout
and then generally larger trees throughout and having multiple canopy layers.
And so in uh uh Jefferson County, um the areas around Deva Bay, you're very familiar
uh because you provided us a letter saying these are areas we think would be great.
Um And they met those uh additional criterias that the commissioner and, and uh we
were looking for is that adjacent to existing habitat um in or, you know, around,
we also know the first attempt we accidentally said within a natural area boundary.
Um And so, uh the areas that were selected are those areas that met that criteria
and are adjacent to the Day Bob Bay Natural Area.
Um Other areas uh that met the criteria were Mount Walker and Notch Pass. Um Very
large federal ownership, obviously, right next door and then that connectivity to
uh what will now be uh more conservation. Uh I think that this is the Devil's
Lake, right? Um Got, got some too many names floating around in my head right now.
But so Devil's Lake here and then of course the day bo area here and so this achieves
or helps to achieve that connectivity aspect. Um And so you can see on here uh
that would be 281 acres of state forest transfer on the other
606 acres of state Forest transfer and then 65 acres of Common School. Um And that
gets to uh part of that uh question of uh acquiring land. Um We
as you know, acquired uh 47 a little over $47 million down in Waking County.
Um Hopefully, uh the majority of that will go to the federal trusts that we're um
identifying to set aside across these counties in western Washington. We did reserve
20 million to look to acquire land uh within uh each of those counties that would
correspond to county cross land. Um with the, with these, with these N CS acres,
you mean? Yes. Yes, exactly. Exactly. Um And so again, this then just provides
that that larger landscape picture um of the existing conservation that we have going
on as you know, around day ba ba that new addition of conservation um
the conservation that will be happening here because more of this will now become
a part of that devil's lake. And so you get again that continuity of, of uh habitat
between those areas, a little bit of mural like here, a little bit of field identified
gold growth up here. So again, that next step is concurrence from the counties and
then finalizing acquiring land, we have to uh appraise each of these
areas and then each of these before they actually get transferred, have to come to
the Board of Natural Resources uh for their approval. And so that's the next big
uh block of work that we'll be doing is once we get concurrence from the counties,
start doing that, work on appraising the land, appraising that timber value and then
matching up, where have we bought land? Where do we still need to acquire land? And
with that, I'm happy to answer any questions that you have. Uh I have a few but in
deference to my colleagues, Greg, do you have a Greg or Kate? Do you have any questions
for Dwayne? Uh Yeah. Uh a couple, appreciate the presentation, the opportunity as
well. Um I was really curious about the the new land, so I think you explained that
really well, Dwayne, appreciate that and I'm sure you've explained this uh to, to
us before, to me before. But if you could reiterate for me with these uh replacement
land, you know, my one concern seeing these additional lands down there is that we've
heard a lot from some of the junior taxing districts down there. And what are the
mechanisms that we, you can use to maintain those trusts? I mean, if, if they, we
buy privately owned land now, can we, um, I think there was some talk about being
able to, I don't know, mix up the trust a little bit so it doesn't all hit in one
fire district and one school district, can you, can you dig into that for us a little
bit? Sure. And part of the reason that we uh acquired uh you or held back 20 million
um of that, the proviso money is to try and acquire land in the same uh area. Um
East Jefferson, if you know, may be difficult, there may not be a lot uh of land
in, in that area that's available. Um One of the mechanisms uh that we are looking
at is something we actually used for the last Gab Bay transfer a couple of months
ago. Um And that's where we actually acquired common school land to
make that one transfer hole and work out. Um And I've had some discussions with Superintendent
Reich do um about that. Um And he said yes, if you can use common school to help
counties, he's all for that. So, uh part of that work would then be trying identify
common school land within the same junior tax district that we'd be buying in in
essence from ourselves and then we would be buying more replacement land for the
common school. We can do that anywhere in the state. Um I happen to have 9115 acres
down in work from county that could go to that. Um So, uh that may be uh a way to
uh help keep the, the junior taxing districts whole. It all depends on how much land
is there. Right. Do you have any idea how much common school land is in, in that
basic region down there? Um I don't, I haven't done that yet.
Ok. Commissioner Eisenhower may know better. I don't know the acres on common school
land in the like quilts or Brennan fire districts. Peter bales is in the room and
he says very low in quilting.
Um Kate, did you have any questions? Um No questions. You know, I
think that um uh like Greg said, helpful to hear kind of how some of these parcels
were designated. Um You know, we have been generally um working from a strategy of
um looking at doing conservation on parcels north of highway 104. Yes, we, we had
our own kind of local criteria and I it just sounds like there's a, a parallel process
that DNR was using for their selection criteria. So I guess I'm just curious, is
there still an opportunity to weigh in with those criteria? Um But perhaps they wouldn't
meet the, the criteria that DNR is needing to um meet for the for the purposes of
this program and to build on what Kate just said. Yeah, we were specifically working
with the region and trying to not identify parcels other than the day Bob expansion
south of 104 to not impact those junior taxing districts. So it's a huge priority
if we identify or you guys identify acres in Quilcene Brennan fire school districts
that we are sure that we find replacement acreages for those junior taxing districts.
And to that. Um And um I had a couple of questions other than
reemphasizing our, you know, we've been collaborating with DNR, working with the
region, working with Brian Turner, the Streets district manager on, on parcels north
of 104. And um one question I had about this, this proposal is uh the, the
connectivity or, you know, um kind of the idea of connectivity between Day Bob Bay
and um Mount Walker and Notch Pass feels a little stretched to me
just because there's major highways. I've uh in the past professional life worked
on wildlife corridors in the Cascades between the Alpine Lakes Wilderness and south
of I 90. And that's how the whole wildlife bridges project got ginned up around the
I 90. Um There's, there's just, there's uh obstructions between Quilcene and Day
Bob Bays and the National Forest. Um So it feels like a little bit of a, a
challenge connectivity area to me but is the idea there to expand the Devil's Lake
Natural area Preserve to include Mount Walker and Notch Pass. Uh I I don't think
the plan is to officially create larger boundaries. Um And that is, that is a separate
process that this proviso, you know, wouldn't allow. Um Although the proviso allows
us to move into that natural resource conservation area status without going through
the public process, creating larger boundaries, really is a public process and, and
needs to go through that full, full process that the concept of connectivity, it's
not going to be for all species. Um But it does provide that that older forest structure
right along, you know, in that more uh contiguous, you know, pattern. Um So again,
you know, there will be, there will be problems with, you know, um you know, amphibians,
there will be problems with, you know, other species, you know, crossing a, a boundary
like uh uh you know, a highway, but then others, you know, they're gonna be able
to cross it, you know, without a problem. So, right, so in, in thinking about um
uh other areas we've identified working with the this with the region. Um We were
looking at like Anderson Lake State Park and the Tamano was Rock Preserve and there's
some parcels south of um Anderson Lake Road right there that are in one of our four
trust land transfer applications that we submitted as part of that initial round
under the new program dune that I was wondering why, why you guys didn't look at
those potential because they are, they are part of a block of larger habitat. I think
it's 900 acres total. It would be between those three parcels, but it's just, that's,
that's another potential area to look. But here's the, um, here's the big uh the
big idea. So I've been paying attention to what's going on in Clallam County. And
I know that the um folks over there, the commissioners and some of the citizens have
been working on a proposal for uh N CS inclusion of some acreage around Lake Sutherland.
And there's pretty universal support for that, that idea, but that didn't get proposed
as part of DNRS acreage for Clallam County. Um Potentially, we could use some of
these acres like the Notch Pass acres or Notch Pass and Mount Walker if, if you needed
that many. But to protect those Lake Sutherland acres in Clallam County because I
know I spoke with, um, Commissioner Osias the other day and he was feeling disappointed
that the two units of the power plant sale became the solution in Clallam County.
While he's, they're supportive of that idea. They were really doing a lot of work
on those Lake Sutherland Acres. So I was wondering if you had any thoughts about
that, Dwayne. Um Well, I haven't talked with, uh Commissioner Fran about the idea
of frankly donating acres, right? Uh From one county to another. Um, I will say,
you know, we know that there were counties that had requested and didn't receive
anything. Um, other counties that had proposed individual timber sales to set aside.
Um, and, you know, our intent is to, you know, be more specific on conservation.
Um, but I haven't talked with the commissioner about that, that idea of, you know,
can we refine, right? We don't want to wholesale say, well, none of those have about
all of these. Um, as you know, I've noted, uh, to our board, we can't move on to
the next stage of work until we get the areas finalized. Right? And so, you know,
we, the, when we were working on the proviso, um some members of the conservation
caucus were concerned that we would just never identify land. And so they wanted,
you know, that, that time commitment in there that we get finality. And I said yes.
And I wanna know, I wanna have finality because we have to continue our work, you
know, managing the trust. So we came to that agreement. Yeah, we, we all want to
get finalization. Um So, uh, recognizing that, you know, you have that,
you know, idea or that, you know, that, uh, desire to maybe, you know, work with
Clallam County. Um I can try and have that discussion with the commissioner. Um,
if you're able to, um, potentially provide again a letter of confer that
not to put any words uh in your mouth. Um But if you were able to provide a concurrence
letter that said, you know, we concur and if, uh, or something like that, that may
be helpful. Um, but I can, I can try and have those discussions with the commissioner,
uh, you know, and see if she's amenable to
do a, a little refining it. Well, I mean, we're, you know, we're all in community
up here. We're working with some of the same ecologists in Jefferson County who are
working in Clallam County and have worked, actually done quite a bit of work on those
Lake Sutherland Acres. So, you know, in terms of structurally complex forests, it
just feels like that area really fits the, the pur or the intent of the proviso more
than mm specifically Notch Pass to us because some folks went out on the ground after
that, you know, these were identified and said, well, those aren't really, you know,
there are, there are segments of older forests within those units at Notch Pass,
but they're largely not older, structurally complex forests. So, just feeling like,
well, what can we do? What's the win win solution here? And, you know, we consider
ourselves close colleagues with our, you know, neighboring county and we're out here
on this peninsula, that's practically an island most of the time. Um Anyway, so,
you know, it was just a conversation that we were having with, um, or I was having
with Mar Marco, I who's been the lead commissioner over there working on these issues.
And, um, and he had already talked with his, you know, seat mates and about that,
the idea of Lake Sutherland. So I felt like there was a, that was almost a fully
baked cake there. And, um, and, you know, so it's just, it's just an idea. I think
we're happy to write a letter of concurrence that, you know, says we're supportive
of the proposal but would like like exploration of this idea. Um And, you know, I
think it could be a win, win for the peninsula, right? Yeah. And so I would definitely
recommend it if, if you do that identify the parcels, right? The whichever Mount
Walker, Nush Pass, et cetera. Um So that
in, you know, in 20 years, you know, our future selves will be able to look and say,
oh, that's why they made that decision. Mhm Yeah, definitely. Can I ask one more
clarifying question of Dwayne? I think you already answered it and I didn't quite
process it, but can replacement lands be bought from private landowners? Yes. Yes.
And that is the intent is we would primarily be looking to acquire land from private
landowners. Um We, I should note because of the change in statute last session
in um uh the House Bill 1460 we are able to acquire land anywhere um
for the benefit of those junior taxing districts. Um Either through, you know, we
could buy land in West Jefferson County that the county just has to determine how
or if, uh, to get the funding to go back to that same junior Taxing district. Um,
that was, that was part of the TLT work group. And I remember having conversations
with Treasurer Prada. You know, is that, could you do this, could we do this? You
know, if so, and, and she said, yes, you know, so, I mean, it already kinda, she
already has to distribute money similarly in other instances. So it was, um, one
of the subcom ons of that trust, land transfer work group solutions. We came up around
replacement lands. There were like four different ways to get at that and that was
one of them. Exactly. Um, and then the other is the land pool concept where counties
can collectively, uh share in the revenue of land that we acquire and, you know,
say it's, we acquire land in Clallam County and then it's determined that 40% of
the revenue goes to Clallam and, and you know, the rest of Jefferson, you're sharing
the revenue um, in a, in a land pool. It's, it's kind of a unitary trust at that
point.
Twain. Could we also do that within Jefferson County pool, our lands and have a,
a distribution model that would, uh, so it wouldn't need to be specific to junior
taxing districts. Um That's a good question. Um They
would still get the funding just on a more consistent basis. Yeah, I, I do, I do
think, um, for new lands that are required that may be possible,
um, it wouldn't, I don't think it would be possible to just take the, the, um, the
existing trust lands and convert them into a unitary trust. Um, the, the statute
that tells us how to distribute the revenue, um, is clear. Um, it actually we just
distribute it to the county and then the county must distribute it in the same manner
as the general tax. Um I think is what the statute says. So, um that concept of creating
a unitary Trust for all of the, the counties combined has been discussed. Most counties
are not in favor of that. Um And then that concept that would have to be a statutory
change to within your county, create a unitary trust, I think. Thank you.
Any other, anything to add Bill?
Yeah, hopefully I can be hurt. I don't hear my heart. So I wanted to first, I
introduce myself briefly. I'm Bill Wells. I'm actually the New Olympic region manager
started uh December 1st of uh just a couple of months ago last year. And so, um first
off, thank you for inviting us to the, to talk at this meeting. And thank you for
all the work that, that you've done on uh working with DNR to identify these appropriate
lands. And I, I also did quite a bit of work on the 2000 acre project, um, during
my stent last year in division working with Dwayne and his staff and, you know,
the commissioner was quite clear throughout that and one of the goals was to, you
know, look for kind of the largest thing for the, for the buck, right? And find areas
that had a large amount of structurally complex carbon dense forest that were adjacent
to uh existing deferred uh habitat. And so, um that's the, that concept
is what led us to the Ns Pass and, and Walker Mountain and, and there was communication
with regional staff at the time as well. So this wasn't uh you know, just out of
the blue to them. So they were aware and, and signed off on these as being good areas
for, for long term conservation. I'm glad because we did our, we did our, you know,
scouts honor that we wouldn't look south of 104. So I was like, yeah, no. And, and
Drew Rosenbaum had mentioned that to me plenty of times and, and he's the one I was
interacting with uh directly on, on those acres and, and, and Brian Turner as well.
And so, um and I can assure you that we did look at at those other areas, Anderson
block, et cetera and these just were the areas that uh we had more of the structural
complex. Um The proximity to Devil's Lake NRC A was, was a big part of that as well,
just bigger blocks of contiguous um habitat. So, um with that, I
don't really have anything else to share. I think Dune's presentation was, was great,
but I, I want to show you that did our Olympic region in particular still committed
to working with you uh on these issues, regardless of, of your decision on the 2000
acre project. And we look forward to uh continuing this discussion. Thank you. We
appreciate you being here and very much appreciate being included in this uh program.
Yeah, I mean, so much. Yeah, that's great almost. I mean, I think we're almost half
the acres so it feels a little like. Mm. Yeah, since we have a little bit of
time, would, would you be all right with seeing if any of the public wants to weigh
in on? Yeah, sure. Because are we, are we considering taking action on a letter of
concurrence today? Sure. It wasn't listed, but I think we should, we should we talk
about maybe what we want to do and then take public comment just so they could respond
to us and not just the nr Yeah, and hopefully a motion on the table as well.
Go ahead. Did you have something Greg? Well, I'll kick it off. I mean, I'm, you know,
the fact that we can kind of restore the trust from everywhere addresses my biggest
need. I mean, I, I hike around notch pass and Matt Walker, those are both really
special places. So, uh I, I believe in the analysis that uh that DNR is done. So
I wouldn't mind, uh you know, sharing the wealth and, you know, giving concurrence
with, you know, if there's a possibility to uh support the, the problem I ask about
like Southland of Southland. Um Then I, I, I'm happy to do that, you know, I, you
know, I think we, I do feel like we've got an abundance of riches in this um in this
protection. So I'm, I'm ready to, to move forward on it and also ready to try to
share the wealth. I'm happy to draft a letter that, you know, talk that talks about
concurrence and also suggests that we're very open to the idea of sharing the notch
past acres with Clallam County. If a proposal could be developed for Lake Sutherland,
which I know is what they're specifically interested in. Sure thing, I believe the
sale is called. Sure thing. Mhm.
Um ok. So I guess we maybe aren't taking action because, um, but maybe just coming
to agreement on a draft um letter for Heidi to bring to us for action at a later
date. But uh although we won't be here next week and that's next week is January
30th is next week or January 31st. 0, my goodness. That next week is our first Monday.
Yeah. So we should probably authorize the chair to sign that letter. Really? Yeah.
Yeah. Um Sorry, gosh, I should have announced that this morning. It snuck up on us.
Um All right. So, um I think we're, I think we're generally in agreement. Does anyone
feel prepared to make a motion?
I'm happy, I'm happy to make a motion to authorize ID to draft a letter myself to
draft a letter of concurrence to DNR for the um set aside of the day, Bob Bay acreage
proposed by DNR 671 acres. I believe the two parcels at Mount Walker and the two
parcels at Notch Pass with a paragraph. I'm referring to Dnrs giving DNR our
concurrence with their negotiation with Clallam County to use those Notch Pass acres
for protection around Lake Sutherland in Clallam County which the commissioners over
there have been working on. All right. Second. All right. Ok. Let's
open this up. Uh for public comment. Anyone in the room or on Zoom would like to
weigh in on this. Um We'll start in the room here. We have Peter Bales and I'm grabbing
that microphone from, oh, yeah, you can go right there,
right? You'll have up to three minutes, Peter the great. Ok. A couple of things um
uh commission of public lands came to Jefferson County. I think it was November and
publicly announced that not only the 671 acres, but also um that she was in favor
of expanding the day Bob Bay natural area as requested by the Jefferson County commissioners
last year. Um That would be, that's about, uh, you know, 3000 acre expansion of the
boundary that includes that, that's 671 acres plus additional older forest plus ravines
and other areas. Um And, um, I just like to get a better idea when that's gonna happen.
And what's, what's the story because just protecting those patches of forest day,
Bob really doesn't do the job. Um Long term for long term management. Um The other
thing is um with Walker Mountain and Notch Pass, I'm a little nervous about supporting
that uh Notch pass giveaway to Clallam unless we actually get out there and look
at it. I think Catherine might have been up there. We've seen some maps of it, but
it'd be great to somehow slog through the snow or whatever ground, ground truth,
those areas um to find out how, what they really look like. Uh They're both close
to federal lands too. So, uh forest Service and there's a lot of um es a list of
species up there. So that is a really logical, excellent place to, to have a landscape
scale conservation area, right? And right near Walker Mountain. And um
also wanna make everybody aware that before we jump to look to other counties to
buy our replacement lands that uh the Jefferson Land Trust and Northwest Watershed
Institute are starting to work with DNR to work closely hopefully to our first
priority and something the commissioners already identified last year is to buy land
in the same Tastic taxing district from rainier. And so we're kind of hoping that
will work and it's great that we have backup options for that. But that would still
be the ideal solution to buy a big chunk of land to help for working forest land,
uh forest board lands in the uh tar area, uh where there's a lot of industrial rainier
land right now. So that kind of is in process and who knows where it'll go. But that's
kind of where we're at with that. So, thanks, thanks for all your work. Thanks Peter.
Anyone. Well, let's uh see if there are other comments and then um give folks a chance
to reply. Uh MS Ryan, I'll bring you over and Miss Ball
supposed to be moving away from gendered titles, but it's tricky first names,
Jane. I know in this case, we know everyone but
um looks like Jean made it over first. So Jean, why don't you go first and then marry
Jean?
Can you hear me? Yes, I can terrific. Um I would like to express immense gratitude
for, you know, towards DNR and towards the commissioners for being willing to engage
in this um to understate it significantly, the laborious process by which we
reached this conclusion and the generous dispensation of the land allotment. Um We
have an embarrassment of riches. It is a wonderful thing to see and I'm very grateful
for that. Um, I agree with Mr Bales that it would be very nice to really ground truth
not pass. Um, it was sort of, um, an unexpected suggestion
and, uh, I do agree that, um, it, it's not so important that Jefferson County hoards
all the trees because really what we're going for here is protection of structurally
complex forests. So, if in that spirit, we are able to trade perhaps notch
pass for sure thing, I think that's a win, win for everybody involved. So I think
that that really warrants a good look. Um I wish to, again underline the importance
of holding whole of the tax and beneficiaries this issue cannot be emphasized sufficiently.
I don't think and, and I know you all get it. That's not the point. But I just, you
know, I, I want to make sure that everybody um holds that as a priority when we consider
these issues. Um The thing. Oh Day Bob, yeah, the Day Bob thing, I'd really like
to see some progress on that. You know, we've had what appears to be movement but
nothing concrete as yet. And that is um an incredibly well supported
expansion within the community. Um You know, we enjoy pretty much unanimous support.
I think the people who have um have submitted questions, it has been questions, not
opposition, this is incredibly well supported. So placing a certain amount of priority
on that I think would serve us all. Well, also, thank you very much for the whole
thing. Thank you, DNR. Thank you, Commissioner Fran and Heidi. We love you. Thank
you.
Thanks Jean and Mary Jean Ryan. Hi. Um I just wanted to
say, um, how appreciative I am. Uh I want to say thanks to uh DNR for all
the work they're doing on the selection process of the 2000 acres. It's, this is
a new process and uh I think it is um it's worth doing this
little bit this period of refinement so that we get the best 2000 acres that we can.
Um Dwayne uh has said many times um uh a a wise statement, you know,
that carbon and, you know, forest carbon does not know county boundaries. And I think,
um you know, where you have a more structurally complex forest. Um In short thing,
we, we all get are gonna get a stronger climate benefit. Um which is what this natural
climate solutions um funding is all about. So I actually find this uh discussion
like really inspiring uh your um willingness to collaborate with another county to
listen to the people. Um in Clallam, who've been working really hard to listen to
their commissioners and to prioritize a uh an area that perhaps will have greater
climate benefit. Um Just fy I um the Center for Responsible Forestry did have someone
go into notch pass and, and, you know, maybe there's further investigation that needs
to be done, but they felt that it was minimally only minimally qualifying in terms
of meeting the criteria versus Catherine's analysis of sure thing, which was like,
you know, really structurally complex. So anyway, I, I wholeheartedly support your
motion and I really thank you. Thank you, Mary Jane. Anyone else online wish to provide
public comment?
All right. Um Anyone wish to respond.
Um I guess I would just say I have the same question that Peter had about Day Bob
expansion, but I'm sure it's in the works. I know Dwayne is spending like 4000 plates
right now. So I would love to hear his response to that question. But um, oh, that
does that fall under Sarah's purview, the expansion of Dave Abe? I Well, I don't
know, I think it's all, I think it's all these guys. Um, anyone interested in weighing
in there? Um Sure I can, uh commissioners. Um, as I noted the budget proviso itself
doesn't allow for just that automatic expansion of the boundary. There is, you know,
clear public process that has to go through with that. Um Excuse me, I know Commissioner
Fran that expressed that desire to, you know, work on the expansion and so that will
be our Natural Areas program, you know, that would start working on that. There's
the public process, the public meetings that have to occur. Um uh, but I'm not even
sure of the entire process um although natural areas program falls under state uplands,
um I haven't been involved directly in, in all of the steps it takes to create or
expand the boundary. But I do know that, that as Commissioner Eisenhower said is
in the works, I just don't know where it is in the process yet. Ok. Thank you. All
right. Anything else before I call the question? All right. All those in favor of
the motion on the table, please say II I carries unanimously. I'll start drafting
tomorrow morning. First thing. Great. So you can get out of town. Yeah. Ok, great.
Well, um thank you to our guests and we look forward to working together um in ongoing
fashion. And uh as you heard, there's a lot of enthusiasm for the work you're doing
here in Jefferson County. So thank you. Thank you. I appreciate you all immensely.
All right. I know. And the public that's worked so hard on this too. Yes. Yeah, absolutely.
Could we take a recess? I got a little bit of an emergency here until 330. Uh 0,
yes. We'll recess for 11 minutes till 330. Good luck Greg. Thank you.
Recording in progress
ready when you are. All right, we're coming back from a recess. So the last item
on our agenda today, which is um continued deliberations on the Shoreline Master
Program. So, should I hand it off to you, Josh to kick us off? Sure. Thank you. Recording
in progress.
Thank you, Dean. Did you want to do that over or are we good on that? We're good.
Just somebody out there a there a capturing. Got it. All right, Josh Peters Community
development director. This is uh uh essentially a continuation of the Shoreline Master
Program or S MP consideration process. Last week, we had a workshop with Lisa Greer
from Burke consulting. Uh Lisa is with us again today and we're joined as well by
the sub consultant from Shannon and Wilson um Amy Summey and um Lisa was there for
the conversation. Amy was able to listen to the video, watch the video and hear what
the discussion was and we talked about it as well. And so we have some slides, the
consultants have some slides they'd like to go through which are really just queuing
up the issue. So this is a little bit different slide show, not so much, how do we
get here, but more like based specifically on what was discussed last week, here
are some options to consider similar to the way that we guided the planning commission
to their discussion. And of course, we're open to any other issues you want to talk
about and hopefully either be able to answer the questions or get you the information
soon. And then in theory, if you're, if you're comfortable deliberating and, and
making some providing us some direction on some of these policy issues, uh no matter
how complicated or difficult. Those decisions are then we can continue to work on
actually producing the next iteration of a proposal. A line in line out Shoreline
Master Program amendment proposal that then we would couple with an ordinance and
adopting ordinance and then we'll put that on your calendar right now. We were talking
about February 12th. I just heard from Barbara that because of an unexpected work
plan issue for her, a jury trial to which she was assigned that could complicate
that a bit, but we're still shooting for that date. Ok.
So unless there's anything else from the board, um, you could take it over at least
and Amy and guide us through what you've got. Ok.
Hopefully you're seeing slides. Yep.
Hm. The part where it advances is not cooperating. Let's see.
Ok. There we go. Uh This slide is showing two pie charts. The one on the left is
showing the share of shoreline area that's upland of the ordinary high water mark,
what the designation splits are. And so from the upland point of view, um, most of
your shoreline jurisdiction is in Conservancy and then uh natural uh followed by
shoreline residential and high intensity. So the bright green is Conservancy, the
dark green is natural, then you can see yellow is shoreline residential and then
a sliver of high intensity in the red there. And then on the water, word of the ordinary
high water mark, you have two aquatic designations, uh straight up aquatic, um which
is almost 60% of your um designation and then priority aquatic about
40%. So, as we talk about the permit types for different areas, it's just to give
you a sense of, of extent.
As Josh mentioned, we have some options to share with you. Um I'll just describe
them. We do have some other information as needed uh beyond this slide. Um uh uh
uh that goes into a little bit more uh detail about the priority aquatic and aquatic
designations. Um And then we do have a little bit of information about um Kitsap,
Clallam and Mason counties that we've discussed before. It's sort of as backup. Sure.
Can you go back to that previous side just for? Ok. So that's aquatic and priority.
And then, so it's all, it's, it's all either aquatic or priority aquatic and then
go forward to the next where you were. Ok. So 100% is priority aquatic
or aquatic. So 100% immediately requires a standard cut. I mean that
makes, so we're going to, we can jump into the detail and show the use table at any
time you want because that's one of the slides or one of the things we could pull
up. So just to this is complicated, but just to reiterate. So
sorry, much of what we deal with in terms of shoreline permit applications is actually
upland, it's landward of the ordinary high water mark. And for example, if someone
wants to build a house, um certainly it's landward of the ordinary high. And so we
use the Shoreline Environment designation as part of the policies that we would consider
some straddles, both like a set of stairs to the beach. Think of that, it's possible
that it could straddle both a dock could start out um on a landward of ordinary high
and then obviously extend water word then of ordinary high. And so anything water
word of ordinary height is in the aquatic designations. That's the principal guiding
thing. The way the planning commission recommendation is currently set up, then
both expanded and conversion to gooey duck aquaculture would be conditional,
discretionary except that in priority aquatic, it would be standard conditional.
And if the abutting upland and designation were natural, then it would be standard
as well and everything else would be discretionary, meaning it could either be standard
or administrative once that judgment is made. So that's how it's set up right now.
And, and I guess there are some aquaculture operations that would be actually taking
place landward of ordinary high. But those are rare, few and in between everything
that's intertidal or floating aquaculture um that subtitle or, or um floating above
the, the substrate would be aquatic only. And then how does Conservancy factor into
that equation? You just articulated? Well, we, we mentioned that because one of the
things that was discussed last week was the possibility of changing some of that.
So instead of abutting just natural, there will be an influence of some other kind
of upland Shoreland Environment designation. And then, and we're sort of pointing
out that if, for example, if the, if the idea were that anything, a budding Conservancy
would be something that, that would affect. What sort of, in other words, you'd have
this standard approach, say discretionary approach. But if we were a budding Conservancy,
it would automatically be ac since 80% of the shoreline Environment designation is
Conservancy. It sounded to us like maybe we should rewrite that and think of it a
different way, everything should be standard with some other exceptions rather than
the other way around. That's what, that's why we put it, produced that pie chart
if that makes sense. Yeah, it does make sense. I think I was getting there, but I
wanted to understand the thinking that went into it.
Any other questions or cause then this, this slide here, which at least is about
to about to launch into is similar to what we do with the Planning Commission in
the sense that we have these options. And then there's a column here for how we want
to go with it or, or maybe some hybrid of any of these. But um I think if you can
ask any other questions at this time or we could ask Lisa to start describing Lisa
and Amy to start describing what these things mean go for it.
Thank you, Josh. Um So the planning Commission recommendation was a mix of standard
and discretionary conditional use permits. And I think Josh covered this quite a
bit but just, just to kind of walk through it, the standard conditional use. So with
the hearing examiner would be required for any proposal in the priority aquatic designation
or if it were a new operation, it would need a standard conditional use permit in
the aquatic environment.
Anything abutting the natural designation, whether it's priority, aquatic or aquatic
would have a standard cup. Everything else would be a discretionary cup
number. Option two is the same as the planning commission recommendation, but rather
than give a discretionary cup for most instances of expansions, um
You could say that um, expansions would be treated like new, which is typically
a standard cup.
So that's option two and then option three was our attempt to try to follow some
of the discussion at your last meeting last week. Um But we did sort of an A and
A B. Um A is make a standard conditional use permit where aquatic or priority
aquatic designations about shoreline residential Conservancy are natural. That would
mean the, the discretionary cup would only be in aquatic or priority aquatica but
high intensity. So that small red sliver the 1%. Yes. Ok. Or
um B would be modify the, the conditional use to make a standard conditional use
permit where aquatic or priority aquatic but shoreline residential or natural, that
would mean that Conservancy, um, and high intensity, um, would have a discretionary
cup,
11 quick interruption on that Lisa, the discretionary CP only for conversion or
expansion. So, again, this, any new, uh, depending on how you define new, but any
new, that isn't expansion would be automatic. C that's the way it's been and that's
the way it's recommended. So, ok, keep going. Sure. Um, the fourth option follows
from the discussion you were having um, last Tuesday about, well, maybe there's some
kind of criteria that could help determine what is a standard or a discretionary,
you know, to go from a discretionary cup to a standard. Um So a four A is already
required new Gooey Duck. Um, operations need uh standards
cup. Um and then conversion or expansion um would need a
standard conditional use permit in the priority aquatic and natural
in any conversion that abuts natural or shoreline residential. And then the third
kind of criteria is based on the extent of to which an expansion or conversion would,
um, you know, exceed 25% of the current area or, and we put X percent
or X acres. Um, there for discussion. Um And Amy, I believe is
uh 25% is for any, currently, the current S MP S for any aquaculture. Um
That's what a determination is for. Yeah, just to clarify that and it's, it's the
current one and correct me. If I'm wrong on this Amy. But it's for, first of all,
all aquaculture except gooey duck. And it has to do with those operations that at
the time they received their federal permits and started operating did not require
a shoreline permit per past Jefferson County S MP S. And so for those operations,
when they want to expand, they're able to do so to a certain percentage. And if they're
gonna exceed that percentage, then they have to come in and get the permit. And so
that's the, that's what the trigger is there. And we just chose that same percentage
as a similar type of threshold. In this case, it would be, when does an expansion
proposal automatically trigger um a standard conditional use permit versus a discretionary
conditional use permit, which again could end up being a standard depending on the
judgment of the code administrator. And so in a sense, we're equating this expansion
idea with this other legal non conforming standard that we've set up for other types
of aquaculture. And also recognizing that that 25% standard for other types of aquaculture
does not exist for gooey duck aquaculture. Now, because any expansion of a gooey
duck aquaculture then requires that operation to get a permit even if they don't
now have a permit.
Hk
mostly tracking this. I'm still going back to the, the charts. Sure.
And we, we're happy to pull up that chart if that would be useful. I've I've got
it open here. It's just translating what you're saying onto the chart. That's ok.
All right. Do you have a use table for each of these options? Um,
I wouldn't say we have a use table yet for each of the options, but we have thought
about what code language would look like to go with the use table. I mean, I, I think
we have a picture of it in our minds, put it that way. And we've also started playing
around with the language, but we haven't got to the point where we're proposing any
language because there are some mix of things to talk about here. And um, we would
take it from there essentially. But um, I don't know, Lisa, do you want to pull up
the, so everybody can see the use table and what it currently looks like that might
help the conversation? Yeah. And while she's doing that, I mean, basically, for me,
it's maybe it would be simpler. I mean, we put these options up for you to think
about. But I mean, the main questions are to me, how do you want to treat
conversions and expansions? How do you want to treat those just from a policy perspective?
Conversions? According to the w we're able to have some discretion at the local level.
We don't even have to have a conditional use permit for example. And we're just talking
about what kind of conditional use permit process then with expansions, it's silent
in the wax. So do you treat that all as new or do you treat sort of if there's a
20 acre operation and they wanna expand two acres, for example, is that considered
new or not? I mean, so that's a policy choice. And those are the seemingly the main
choices. And then of course, what process do you want to use for those two types
for either expansion or conversion? Do you want a discretionary? Do you want administrative?
Do you want a standard Cup? That seems to be the main conditional use permit process
question before you? Do you, do you think that they're silent? The whack is silent
on the expansion question because expansion is essentially new acreage. It's essen
essentially new if you're going into new ground, right? It's like a timber harvest,
you know, and an adjacent timber harvest, you need a new, new forest practices application
because it's different trees to cutting down except it's all visible. And I mean,
in some ways, you have a lot more information with an expansion or conversion of
what kind of operation is being run, you know, you know, are they keeping track of
their gear? Are they practicing? Are they following the B MP S? Like, I think there's
a lot to be said for just having more information on a um existing or converted.
And if they're not um practicing best B MP S, you would want a standard conditional
use permit process because then that's where that would come out. Correct. But the
discretionary allows then the administrator to put it to the hearing examiner. Yeah,
I guess ultimately the conditional use permit that comes out of the process
is the same thing regardless of how you got there. And ultimately actually would
be a college decision to accept the local government decision or to modify it or
to deny it. That would be a college choice at the end of any shoreline conditional
use permit process. And I guess back to your question, Commissioner Eisenhower, I
don't know without looking at the entire record of the agency rule making process.
I don't know what they were thinking or not thinking about expansion. Maybe it never
came up, don't know, but we do have conflicting apparently information about how
Mason County does things, something I could check on by talking to the planning director
there. But we heard today that they treat all, I mean, someone said that all that
all the new is, excuse me, all the expansion is treated just like new and then we
had someone else say no, no, that's not actually what happens. They, they have an
expansion policy. So I don't know. Hm, um, in the discretionary cup,
is there a, um, uh, uh, comment period for, uh, neighbors are still notified? Correct.
Right. So, so the discretionary is the choice of whether to use a standard cop or
the administrative cop and for either one of those, there is a public comment period.
The difference would be one is tied with a public hearing before a third party that
we've contracted to make these decisions as the hearing examiner. The other one does
have a written public comment period, like other type two processes in our unified
Development code. And then so all those comments are accepted, they're also sent
out to agencies and almost I I don't know about all. I don't know how to say that.
But certainly most in my experience, policies that have to do with in water work
have state Environmental Policy Act review associated with it. So there's that component
as well. It's sent to the college, part of their SEPA register and so forth. So there
is a comment period and we can we can condition that proposal just as much as we
can condition. The other one is just that just that who's making the the final local
government decision, the actual final decision because it's shoreline management
is ecology. Mm. Mhm. Ok. And if there is a hearing, it's with the hearing examiner,
that's correct. Mhm
Lisa. Were you um wanting to, to keep going or were were you at a natural stopping
point for this conversation? Um The other slides we have are more as if it comes
up. We have um we have some description of the priority aquatic and aquatic designations
that are in the SNP and then we had a side by side, um, rough comparison of um, the
cup process and a couple of the other counties that we've been speaking about. We
wanted to spend most of our time on the options and see where you wanna go. Sounds
helpful to run through the rest of your slides and then, uh, come back to the options.
Does that work for you, Greg Heidi? Yeah, great.
So, uh, let's go on to the next.
Um, so these are the side by side of the other counties, Amy. Do you wanna kind of
just run through this briefly? Sure. Um, basically the three other counties that
we looked at all of them require, um, ac up for New Gooey Duck. Um, and two out of
the three require it also for conversion. I looked for, um, any kind of text about
expansion and I couldn't find it in any of the cups that we looked at. So it's, they're
just kind of silent and I, I didn't hunt for like a separate, um, Mason County policy
about that. Although I, I did hear from Josh earlier today that, um, there's kind
of two different opinions about how Mason County does things, um, in all of those
counties, the cup process requires a hearing and, um, for two of them, or actually
one of them, uh, Kapp County also does have kind of another subtype. I think that
came up as well a little bit in the discussion last week. Um but it doesn't have
anything to do with aquaculture. It's specifically as a subtype that's used for shoreline
stabilization proposals. Otherwise, everybody just kind of goes with the traditional
cup with a hearing format.
OK.
In this slide, we're just um sharing uh a little bit more about the, we had shared
the priority aquatic description and the aquatic description. Last time we wanted
to share the criteria for priority aquatic in the center there. Um Because the question
was, I think on the left hand side, um when it talks about vital for salmon and shellfish,
is that commercial or is that habitat oriented? So the criteria in the center there
are, you would be a priority aquatic designation. If you have documented endangered
species Act, listed, listed uh sal mounted streams and marine habitats estuaries
that support endangered Species Act, uh listed salmon rearing other freshwater shorelines
that provide habitat for cell mons um intact drift cell processes, documented forage
fish and or important inter title and subtitle shellfish areas. Most
of Jefferson County 42% apparently. Ok. And, and aquatic
is everything that's not designated as priority aquatic. So it doesn't have other
particular criteria.
Um
Can you help me understand the role of uh the presence of eel grass?
Does that prohibit um Gui duck aquaculture? If if is it a certain amount of eel
grass is present? The species of eel grass I'm hearing. This is a big limiting factor
in Gui duck production.
Yeah, if I could ask perhaps Amy you to look up specifically references to El Grass
in our code that would be helpful. And meanwhile, though I can speak to it from a
former manager of state-owned aquatic land, I know that when we did leases for aquaculture,
now DNR only has like a handful if even of pilot leases for intertidal
gooey duck aquaculture. It's actually pretty rare. According to their website, there's
only 200 acres throughout the entirety of Puget Sound. That's in intertidal gooey
duck aquaculture on private, on private Thai lands, I think as well. Because again,
on public Thailand state-owned aquatic lands, there's, there's very limited cuey
duck aquaculture. And as I mentioned, last time, most of gooey duck activity in Washington
State is subtitled, harvesting through tracks that are sales uh that are sold to
interested parties or used by tribes through the graffiti decision, which is a subset
of the bolt decision which has to do with our treaty rights. And those are all um
when they're done by DNR, they're done by auction actually, um which really affects
the DNR bottom line as I mentioned. So most of that is harvesting subtitling inter
title is relatively rare if you look at it from that standpoint according to the
information on the DNR website. So when we did aquaculture in general and, and when
DNR does leases for aquaculture, um there are stewardship measures that have to do
with the native eel grass, Zoster marina and not the Zoster Janica, which is
even perceived sometimes as a noxious weed actually. And so we differentiate between
the eel grasses when trying to protect native eelgrass. And absolutely, there were
buffers from eelgrass and so sometimes there were lease holds that contained eelgrass
within, but then the lease itself through those habitat stewardship measures would
maintain buffers from the eelgrass beds and have only the commercial activity outside
of those eelgrass beds. Now that I've sufficiently talked enough and I give Lisa
Lisa Na me a chance to find our code section. What did you find? Um It says specifically
in your code that aquaculture use and development shall be cited so that shading
and other adverse impacts to existing red brown macro algae kelp and eel grass beds
are avoided. Ok. So that's that's pretty clear. Mhm. Mhm. Ok.
Yeah. So I think, you know, maybe one more slide on this, this is are the it's under
the state shoreline rules that, that guided the preparation of the shoreline master
program. It has an aquatic designation, it doesn't have multiple but jurisdictions
are allowed to vary and some do have this split between aquatic and priority aquatic.
Um
So these are the policies on which the master program had to respond to. So if you're
designating aquatic, um you should have management policies that uses that
adversely impact ecological function should not be allowed um except in those other
circumstances and they should assure no net loss of ecological function and you'll
find similar language in your S MP. Um shoreline uses and modifications should be
designed and managed to prevent degradation of water quality and local government
should reserve shoreline space for shoreline preferred uses. So again, we come to,
there needs to be ecological protection and no net loss. Um but there also needs
to be allowance for preferred uses. Um that would include water dependent type uses.
So, within this designation or either designation, there has to be some, some
balancing of, of both of those
and the um the application requirements. Um In the current draft of the SNP specifically
include a requirement that the applicant uh submit measures to address impacts to
achieve no net loss. And then there's a couple other kind of scattered references
to no net loss being um a priority and something that needs to be achieved and demonstrated.
So I believe that's it because we're just back to the, the overall overarching schedule.
So I'll stop sharing here unless you would like me to go back to anything, maybe
the um options table. Sure.
And these are by the way, just options for you to consider where you end up could
be some hybrid or something that's not even represented on that chart. So it's not,
not meant to preclude other consideration. Just hopefully getting to think about
different ways you could go with this based on what we've heard so far.
Yeah, so hard. So we have 12 different categories to, to be talking about potentially
and um Greg's got his hand up. Oh, go ahead, Greg. Yeah, I just had a question for,
for Josh, today we heard about uh um comments from, you know, kind of both sides
of the issue about Mason County. And I'm wondering, did you have other information
because we heard from both the shellfish industry and, and from MS Showalter that
uh expansions were treated as a new, uh, a new operation. And I'm wondering, was
there something else that I missed or you can go into that a little bit more?
I would say that I don't have the answer to the question right from the horse's mouth
if you will. Um But I do have a relationship with the planning director there. I
could, I could ask the thing is I think that if I could just paraphrase what I heard
this morning is that MS Show Walter was citing the code and I think at
least she was trying to differentiate between the conversion and the expansion policy
by reaffirming that Mason County's S MP does not require a conditional use permit
for conversions, which again is what the W gives low governments the discretion to
decide. Whereas Kit and Clallam have decided that conversions would be condition
uses. We've so far and all of the discussions have decided the same that conversions
would be conditional uses. It's just a matter of what kind of process to get there.
So in Mason's County, Mason County's case, they've decided that conversions will
not require a shoreline conditional use permit and they were they and then M Walter
cited a particular description of new or, or something like that. I believe they
were silent on expansion. But her interpretation, if I could paraphrase would be
that ex expansion was treated as new and I believe if I heard correctly. Uh Mr King
from Taylor Shellfish said that in effect, they have a different permit process or
policy around legal non-performing uses and the expansion or perhaps just the expansion
of our operations to with which I'm not familiar. Um Amy did, as she said, um a review
of the, what the code says and couldn't come up with something specific around this
issue. If it's something that is important to us to find out, we can certainly try
to find out from Mason County what they do. I also think that back to the back to
your question. I think last time Commissioner Eisenhower, um it's in our court to
decide what we want to do,
right? I guess I just heard Mr King say expansion was treated as new in Mason County
and that they were ok with that. I thought that's what he said. Did you, Kate Heidi?
How did you interpret that? Yeah, I remember this morning when he said that and he's,
I don't remember the second part of his statement though, I guess if you said because
remember if New Gooey Duck, according to the W A from, I don't know, 2011, 2012,
whenever it changed requires a conditional use permit. So I thought I heard something
different. I thought he was countering. I thought he was sort of thankful for the
opportunity to, to bring up a point that, that they actually had an expansion policy.
That was something short of a condition use permit again though. I don't remember
exactly what he said. Got you. Yeah, language can be big.
Yeah, thanks. Hm.
And that goes, I'm so sorry, but that, that does go to number two. So, so that policy
choice there, um which we did prevent to present to the Planning Commission at their
November 15th meeting that they were making their final recommendations that, that
this question came up a lot that the whack asylum on expansions, the proposal that
had been put forward for the public hearing version said that expansions would have
a different policy. Essentially, it would be, it would be treated just like conversions
rather than treated just like new. And that is a policy choice that I think that
if you want to clarify this table, if you, if you just even just tackle that first,
like how do you want to treat expansion? Are all all expansions the same? Or would
a relatively small expansion relative to the current operation be treated differently
than, than a large expansion off of a small operation or a large expansion period
and, and whether it's acres percentage, any of those things. And so that would just
be a policy choice. And then once you make that choice, then the rest of it is a
perhaps a little easier because then it simplifies the rest of the choices around
the process that you want. Mhm. Mhm. Thanks.
Is it deliberation time? What's that? Is it deliberation time? I think so. Yeah.
Yeah. Do you want to close the public hearing?
Well, we might um and once we have another draft, did we come to a final um
decision on this? If we have another draft, do we open a new hearing? Versus? Yeah,
and I did confirm with Barbara quickly on that today. Um Our understanding was that
we left the hearing open specifically because following direction from the board,
we would prepare another iteration that reflects that direction and couple that with
an ordinance and then make all of that information available to the public for comment
and then we would set it up enough in advance that people could have a comment. However
you want to take it whether you just want it to be written or actually have a public
comment period on the day that you're electing to consider that ordinance. And so
I would recommend that you don't close the public hearing for that reason. Ok. And
we might just have to waive our one testimony per hearing for this doesn't have to
happen anyway. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I'm glad you consulted with, uh, Barbara Earl with
him. So that's great. Ok. Um, Greg, does that mean you're ready to deliberate?
Sure. Yes, I'm ready. Um, I guess I'll, I'll lay my cards on the table though.
You know. Honestly, none of these options are options. I would, I don't know, crawl
in a PV C tube to die on. Um, I think I still favor, uh,
option one. Option two is palatable as well. Based on testimony. I heard rationale
for me is, I think we have basically four different stakeholder groups that have
given strong feedback on this. And, uh, you know, with the planning Commission recommendations,
which I take very seriously, um, and looking at it through the lens of regulatory
reform and as aquaculture is a, you know, a pre preferred use. I don't, uh, and then
I, I, the tribal input that we've had supports this recommendation as well and, you
know, neighborhood and I think they've spoken kind of with a voice as well. Um, you
know, want something stronger. I think any hearing that we have is going to be a
microcosm of the process that we've had here. As I've, I've talked about, you know,
I've, there's still room for feedback but, you know, having gone through the,
the producing processing of, of cannabis, it can, hearings can be a, a real,
um, a real burden So I guess I would always err on the side of regulatory reform
and uh the prime, you know, preferred use. I know that they're, they're unsightly.
I, I can acknowledge I wouldn't want a field of tubes next to me. Um
Yeah, that's where I am. I can go into more details, but that's, that's the short,
the, the, the cliff notes version of my, my perception, right? And I am happy to
give mine. I also agree um that the Planning Commission are Saints bless their
hearts, right? For all the work they've done and all the, they've worked long and
hard on this and considered a lot of input. I also support option one, but I, I leaned
strongly towards option two because I here that expansion, it's, it's new beach,
it's new ground, it's your opening, new area. And I was trying to look at a way to
nuance that by asking about the whole threshold thing. But I anyway, you cut it,
it's a new area. And so I like being clear that expansions
um are treated like New Gooey Duck operations because it can I respond to that real
quick? I just, I, I guess there's a lot of nuance there, right? And all these, you
know, little d or whatever, but just a matter of the hypothetical, you know, Taylor
is expanding their Gooey Doc operation. Um as Josh has said, you know, they could
be really small, it could be really large it could be eel grass. There could be not
a discretionary conditional use permit doesn't rule out a hearing, it just doesn't
make a hearing automatic. And the, the, I mean, I guess conversion can be so many
different things, but as I said, I'm ok with option two, I just feel like it's uh,
um, yeah, the first step in a slippery slope and, and I think there's not all conversions
are the same, uh conversions or expansions. I'm sorry, expansions is what I meant
to say the whole time. I know I said conversion to drop, but I meant expansions.
All right. Just trying to make it a little more confusing. No, II I um what do either
of you? Um uh We talked last time about the, the threshold, for example, the, the
25%. Um you know, is that of interest to consider uh
assessing that before deciding if it's so the wake up in the middle of the night
that night for me was all night was 25% of what, 25% of four
acres is an acre. But what if that acre is the most, you know, it just felt like
a that felt like a slippery slope to me. The threshold did. Um Because how do you
first, how do you define the threshold?
And then um and then what if that 25% hypothetically
is 25% of the most important habitat for? And you know, it just felt problematic
to me even though I,
sorry, Heidi, I didn't mean to step on you. It was, I mean, the threshold idea, the
word threshold did come out of my mouth first, I think. And so I apologize but I,
I, I came out and then I spent the whole night that night laying there thinking about
it and
yeah, doesn't feel that it's very defined, doesn't, it feels like a slippery slope
to me, I guess I'd say in these last days of the Chevron deference uh landscape,
I, I would love to, um, trust our staff to interpret with the discretionary CP whether
that threshold was, you know, for them to set this threshold based on a case by case
basis,
uh, staff to set the threshold. I mean, wouldn't that need to be in code? No, that's
typically what you're doing with the discretionary discretionary, conditional use
permit and correct me if I'm, I'm mischaracterizing it. Josh. But if you have the
discretionary, then if it's, you know, 50% or, you know, it, it, it is impactful
in, in a myriad of ways that we couldn't possibly delineate in code. We're just giving
them the administrative discretion to say, yeah, this is a, this is a big one, you
know, we should have a hearing. So I, I think that's, I would say that's a better
way to establish a reasonable threshold for any particular project than AAA percentage
that we come up with in these chambers. See, I think the discretion is still there
because if the acre that they're wanting to expand into is the most prime habitat
for endangered species, then they get to say, oh, that probably then should be a,
a standard. So you can't go to the hearing examiner. Um, like the discretion is still
there. It just gives a some certainty around scope. Yeah, I, I hear you
a, a again, I, you know, I, I wouldn't, I, I would feel like there was still a balance
struck if we treated expansions like new buoy deck operations.
Um, and I'll, I'll repeat myself a little bit just in saying that I, I think that
we actually have a lot more information, you know, if, what we're trying to manage
for is folks who don't, um, you know, manage their, their operation as well as we
would hope. Right? Because, I mean, keep in mind this is the fifth permit that these
folks will have gotten forth. I mean, there's, there's a number of permits that come
before this one. This is the last one. and they have agreed to B MP S
well, before this point. Um, you know, and, and we know the challenges we don't have
the ability to enforce very well and army Corps and ecology aren't out here doing
that very often either. Um, but, you know, they have agreed to a bunch of B MP S
and then, you know, so we at least have the opportunity to hear from neighbors and
say, hey, are they, are they taking good care? Are they good neighbors? Are they
good stewards um with an expansion or a conversion? Which is more information than
we have on a new application.
Um It's from an entity that we've already been in business with for decades. Right.
Mhm. Yeah. Yeah, it's true.
Um I, I put my kind of where I could si would maybe want to land. Um I put it into
a little matrix, maybe I could pull that up and just talk about how I got to came
to those decisions. And uh it's probably not new to um many of you because that's
kind of what I talked about last week is really trying to get to impacts um and
practicability. So I'm, I'm also not terribly wed to
these. Um Again, I think that that residential is where we are most likely to have
um challenges, just more eyes, more people impacted the density of, of, of people
around. Um So I could see keeping residential at just a, a standard cup. Um
And expansion of conversion could be discretionary so long as the um expansion or
conversion is less than 25% I would say of the cause it's, it's actually a permitted
amount of land. Correct. The permit is for a number of acres. Correct.
Yes.
Um But sometimes expansions in the case of aquaculture in general. Oftentimes that
threshold is used to determine whether that operation should come under a permit,
a shing permit or not when it hasn't been required to in the past because it's considered
legal, not conforming. So, so that's how we usually deal with the 25% threshold.
This would be new in the sense that it's, I think irrespective of whether the current
operation is permitted or not, it's more like what is the current operation? What's
the footprint? Yeah. So less than I would propose, less than 25% of that could be
discretionary. If it were 25% or more would remain of the standard cup if I may.
It occurs to me that in the list that we just gave you four options, I think that
we just collectively forgot or I forgot to think of the other option. Of course,
which is what some of the commenters were asking for, which is just capital c
throughout the table here for Gooey Dark, I forgot to say that and we didn't list
that I think and like if I, unless I'm just not picturing that table that we showed
you. Um, but in other words, that was how the planning commission left it back in
2021 which is why you've heard from people saying we like what the planning commission,
some people we like what the planning Commission did back in 2021. Well, of course,
the industry had a different opinion essentially. So just to be fair, you could,
that would simplify the whole package by just going capital c across the court. Yeah,
one thing I'd like to bring up um and I mentioned this to, to Josh um offline. So
if you have 100 acre operation, 25% is another 25 acres. If you have a 10 acre operation,
25% is 2.5. So 25 versus 2.5,
so that a percentage threshold allows gigantic expansions in the case of a large
farm, right? That was one of my wake up in the middle of the night things. And so,
um I think one of the diagrams or one of the options, I think had 25% or an absolute
acreage limit. So I, I really think that you should contemplate having um two
thresholds at 25% but no more than 10 or something along those lines. That's why
we put X acres there because we didn't want to be prejudicial about what you were
thinking in terms of the threshold. And again, it, it is exactly like Commissioner
Brother can describe that whole threshold concept if I understood correctly from
last Tuesday was essentially meant to be guidelines for the code administrator in
making that discretionary call. So it's not just case by case, it would be case by
case. And also this these things that would trigger automatically ac and essentially
take that judgment call away. That's how I interpret it. That's how we tried to write
that option. Yeah. No, I agree. And that is on my list of points too that I think
it should be up to a limit, um, which would automatically then kick it back to, uh,
standard.
Um, I'm not remembering offhand what I, um, exactly what else I changed here from
the draft. Um, but I, I guess I just do want to say, I think the shellfish industry
is really important here in this county. Um It is different than Kitsap and Clallam
County. Um for different reasons. Kitsap is more suburban Clallam has
um more straight shoreline, very little kind of protected uh shellfish growing areas
than Jefferson County does. It is our largest farm gate sale of any agricultural
product in the county. Um I know that a lot of this gooey duck is not eaten um locally,
but I do know having been a diversified farmer that I grew crops that were not to
be sold locally, but that made the operation sustainable. Um We sold uh we had acres
of ginseng at Finn River. That, that was our wholesale crop that made everything
else possible. And so um I think this is shell. The shellfish growers are a big part
of our economy and Gui duck is AAA piece of that that helps keep them sustainable.
Um I have been a number of times to the, the day Bob operation which employs a lot
of people, a lot of highly skilled people. Um And I just think it's a great example
of the kind of industry we want to need here. We do know there have been some players
who haven't complied um with a, a changing regulatory framework, but we know that
there are a lot of growers who do and there are, this is a highly regulated industry.
Um And I would really like to build in more reference to existing B MP S that um
so that we have something to be able to hold folks to even though we know enforcement
is extremely challenging. But um you know, when I think of people like Ralph Accio,
you know, small shellfish grow, it's the kind of industry I want to see flourish
here and think that we are really uniquely capable of supporting. Um So that's where
I'm interested in, you know, providing protection where it's needed, you know, natural
priority aquatic. I get it. Um But II I want to get, try to get at the
impacts with stronger regulations there and then make it a little easier for growers
um in areas where that's less impactful.
I mean, do we get an answer about whether the gooey ducks mentioned in priority aquatic?
The whack were commercial or wild or, I mean, they're explicitly listed as a, as
a preferred use and the uh priority of product, Lisa, I think you, you and Lisa thought
it was wild set. That was, that was my first conjecture on that. And so just to clarify,
it's not the wack because again, priority aquatic is something that we've chosen
to put into. Our, our S MP W A just talks about aquatic, but also gives local governments
some, some um, leeway to come up with other shoreline environment designations we've
chosen to create priority aquatic. I think we've defined it. And if you think about,
if I think you equipped Commissioner Eisenhower, that isn't that all of Jefferson
County because it sounded like we have a lot of natural, basically natural shoreline.
I don't mean natural, like specifically as capital NS MP, but we have a lot of high
quality, ecologically valuable shoreline and we should be thankful for that. I am.
And so I think we recognize in our own master program that, that the basically what
we want to do is keep things functioning the way they are and, and don't allow things
that'll get in the way of that. That's why if you look through the use table, I think
the best way to understand what it means is to look through the whole use table and
not just the aquaculture section, but to see where there's differentiation between
how we would consider proposals for use and development in priority aquatic versus
aquatic. I'm not looking at it, but I'm willing to bet that we are more restrictive
in terms of things like floating infrastructure or docks piers floats all that kind
of thing that we would be more restrictive in the priority aquatic than we would
be in the aquatic. So I guess just think of it from that perspective. I don't think
it precludes though aquaculture cause if I remember correctly, it is a p in prior
in priority aquatic for aquaculture, not cuey duck but other types of aquaculture.
So I don't think we were saying that all of this prior 42% of our aquatic area is,
is to be restricted, such that we won't have anything there. It would just be sort
of extra cautious about what we choose to allow there but done correctly. Aquaculture
could be a piece of that. I think that that's, that's how I would interpret the table
just by looking at the letters in the, in the columns. We only have five minutes
till um we need to adjourn. So um seven if we go off the
Clock tower. Oh, right. Um
How do we want to direct staff for our next to our next meeting? Um Could I go through
a couple of other points just in spending the weekend doing some research and um
having some conversations around this that I, I would love for you all to hear. Um
uh Like I said, II, I would really like to find a way to pull in some of the other
B MP S um from permits, you know, shellfish growers put a lot of work into other
permit applications. Um And they commit to a number of practices that we don't
include in our, um,
in our code here, proposed code. And I, I, again, I, it's this whole kind of question
of how to not recommit to redundancies. Um You know, we could
no pull, you know, require other, per the other permits get submitted with the application
so that it's part of the, the facts of the case or um I don't know, I'm just trying
to think how, what's the best one, not extra work, right? It's just, yeah, it's work
that's already been done but can be referenced, you know, for example, um derelict
gear, you know, that is addressed in um in other permits. Um You know, the,
and I'm not sure if this is in response, but, you know, some shellfish growers will
have regular gear patrol where they go out on a regular basis to and, you know, do
walk their shoreline, collect any um any, any derelict gear plus after a storm
event. Um And you know, just how like, how can we incentivize that since it's already
being identified in other B MP S even the, the, the uh Pacific Northwest Shellfish
Growers Association have B MP S. OK, when you call A B MP. Um I know that's the best
management practice, but are you suggesting that we have a suite of conditions that,
that we impose on folks who are applying for a conditional use permit, whether it's
administrative or full. Is that what you're suggesting? No, but I think, and I, I
won't know the level of detail on this, that Josh might or certainly others do that
other permits, you know, again that have already been applied for and probably
granted, I think we, we require that um, other, the nationwide permit and others
have been obtained before applying for this one. have B MP S that I, I guess, I don't
know if the application is kind of, you know, people speak to how, how do they plan
to meet those B MP S or if they are required to um, say that they will follow those
B MP S because I know, I mean, I think of B MP S as non regulatory, they're, they're
just best practices, right? They're not a, a backstop uh a requirement. Um But it
sounds like just other permits are already addressing those. And so trying to think
how do we pull that in without being repetitive or redundant, but still
have some consistency and some assurance that the position of a new permit could
be compliance with B MP S that were part of previous. Yeah. Yeah. But I just don't
know, you know, and I have not dug into exactly how the different permits ask for
it, but if I could comment on that. So in two minutes,
my, my experience in having worked, worked for different agencies now is that every
agency likes to be the last one. Right. Right. DNR gets to be the last one when it's
stayed on aquatic land because it's a proprietary thing. Like, if you want this lease,
it's not just a regulatory deal. Like if you want this lease, this is what you're
gonna have to do. And it's written into the rules for DNR that they have all the
other permits have to be in place. So they are kind of like the last one. Fish and
wildlife doesn't like to do SEPA. They like the local government to do SEPA. Um But
there's also not an HP A for aquaculture. So I would say actually there's fewer permits
in some ways, ironically, I suppose, perhaps than some other operations, like, uh
like just a, like a pier or a dock. But I would say that the, also the, there's different,
ok. So the requirements, the conditions of the nationwide permit from the Army Corps
of Engineers is typically what's been sort of the standard for aquaculture operations
that is in flux if I understand, unless they've actually already reached the new
nationwide permit for aquaculture. I'm not sure. I kind of lost track of that. I'm
sorry about that. But I know that that was something that there was a nationwide
permit in place number 48 and there was a lawsuit and then they had to go back to
individual permits and now they're working on a nationwide permit to replace that
one. And those are only good for a certain amount of time anyway. So that's the whole
federal side. Again. They have, they have interests that are particular to those
federal statutes that they're trying to enforce our shoreline management, I would
say is a little broader. We do have conditions. We absolutely have conditions in
our current S MP that we've already put in place for aquaculture. Oftentimes they're
not too dissimilar from other things, they might be a little different. Um And I
know that we're, we're sensitive to that redundancy question as well, but we also,
there is a, the joint Aquatic Resources permit application or jar O that is meant
to try to tie things together neatly. We do require people that, that need to get
all the other permits they need to get and be compliant with those permits. So we
have an enforcement mechanism or a coen for mechanism for that. Um The industry also
has its own B MP S which we haven't, I don't think converted to a letter to regulations,
but they do have their own B MP S. And oftentimes when we ask them, how are you going
to meet this standard? This no net loss standard. For example, they will produce
information that includes their own B MP S and how they're going to do it. And they
would say great do that and then we write into the permit that you have. So that's
what you have to do. So I would, I guess I would say I feel pretty comfortable. We
already have most of what you just said, but maybe there's something I'm missing
in there. Well, and there's always the difference between what is written in our
code versus what is part of a permit application, you know. So it says here I'm looking
at, um, oh sorry, it's gonna find, take a while to find the heading. But I um page
150 predator exclusion devices shall be firmly attached or secured, so as to not
become dislodged, um you know, rubber bands, small nets shall be promptly recovered
and disposed of. So, you know, I get that it says that I don't know what that translates
to in an application is that, you know, demonstrate how you will ensure that all
predator exclusion devices will not become, you know, debris in the marine environment
or, you know. Um So it's a little hard to know the application just based on how
our code is written. Um But I still would like to find some way to like reference
the other. Um I'm using B MP S to talk about kind of where, what other permit?
Yeah, permit conditions have already been committed to, to get to the same impacts
of in this case, uh derelict gear and plastics in the marine environment,
but maybe that's in an application format that I just don't know about or it's something
that can be added. Yeah, these are the other permits applied for and received by
this entity. Yeah. So that like that's a kind of practical.
Uh I don't know, I would rely on you to tell me if that is built into the process
somewhere. Um
I guess I, I'm following what you're saying and I would,
I would say again that I feel like the way it's currently set up from our standpoint
works. OK? I'm, I'm echoing, I'm hearing in my mind like a lot of the, the um comments
from the industry that they want to make sure that they weren't being asked for something
and then they, they'd have to produce a slight variation of that thing over here
for us. And I, I remember answering that if you've produced a report that's required
by another agency and it meets the spirit and the letter of what we're asking for
because of this policy, submit that or if you've gone through a N A process, we could
use that information for our SEPA process and those kinds of things in order to get
to a more efficient decision. But I would say that we have a whole set of regulations.
And in fact, I'm hearing Mr King say that you have too many pages of regulations.
It went from X number of pages to Y number of pages and there's too many. So I guess
my question back to you would be I'm not sure what you're asking us to do in terms
of the rubber hitting the road. Like for me a lot, a lot of times, like I, because
I hear at the Planning Commission a lot of discussion about things, ideas policy
and it's always back to, ok, so what, what should it say actually in our code? Because
that's what we enforce, that's what we use. So I'm not sure if I'm following you
and what it should say. Well, I think it's because I don't know, the format of the
application is the, is the application saying, demonstrate how you are going to stop
derelict gear from entering the marine environment. I would say the application you
asked for is the jar. So that has all the things you've got the jar, you've got the
S A checklist. And then when we go through the specific, there's a table in this
proposal actually that, that we produce upon, upon recommendation of the Jamestown
Scotland tribe and they were happy with what we came up with at the table. Not everybody
was happy with every element of it, but we came up with a thing. These are all the
things that you would need to demonstrate to us in order to meet the conditions that
we have the policy that we set forth on R and P around this use and the no net loss
standard. This is what you have to show us. So show it if you can show it if it shows
it, if you're able to demonstrate that through the DARPA and the C A checklist alone.
Great. If it requires an additional report that that uh would have to go into more
detail about that item, then you're welcome to do that. If you've already done that
for another editing agency, you can turn that in and there are some cases where that
particular element is not applicable to this particular application type or, or based
on where you are proposing to do it. That was another thing that came up in the discussion
is that do we automatically have to turn in every single one of these things? And
the answer was no, not automatically, we can have a pre application discussion. We
can figure out which things are actually applicable to what you're proposing and
where and we try to differentiate between different kinds of uses between Oyster
and Clam versus Gooey Duck.
And Josh, I put the language about being able to use other studies from other federal
or state entities in the chat there. And I think it's on um page 158 of
239. Thank you. And, and I realized that, you know what we in no way want to make
you feel rushed about this decision. So and I'm feeling, I guess rushed in terms
of the hour here. So whatever you wanna do, we can set up another time. Um can't
always, you know, sometimes Lisa and Amy will be available to, sometimes they won't.
And of course, we have, um we still have a task to write up this ordinance. So, but
I mean, really, I mean, we want to do this right, rather than rushed. So just don't
feel rushed.
Yeah, we didn't have a cons, did not have a consensus on option. Right. Right. Hard
to write an ordinance if we don't know which option to go with. Um uh
So we Heidi did you have a a clear? Yeah, I was happy with the Planning Commission's
recommendation and including expansions in the full, full conditional use permit.
That was option two, I believe option two on the four options that were up there,
but you didn't want to threshold. Right. No, that's what I apologized for my
because I found it confusing or potentially confusing. Although the way that Kate
wrote it seemed fine to me 25% wrapping. Were you number two? Also uh
I prefer the Planning Commission recommendation but uh I would be, I would be ok
seeing the draft uh following the number two, the uh uh just a straight C for, for
the uh for expansions. Mhm With no threshold Greg A threshold at that point,
the threshold is number four just to be clear. The threshold is and I did get a number
five that Joshua is referencing just to be clear on number two, whatever new is in
the chart, that's what expansions would be, I think there were a couple of instances
of discretionary CP for, for new. So it would just whatever new is, that's what would
be. Thanks for that. That's how I understand it.
Those discretionary ones were only for upland designations were not a heck of a lot
of gooey duck aquaculture will happen anyway. Right. And, you know, then we can,
I mean, with looking at number two, we also still have number one all drafted, which
I'm still, you know, hankering for but fine with either of those options. What were
you saying? We do have number one drafted, don't we? Yeah, that's what I'm saying.
I might still try to argue for number one when we actually, when we come back together,
but if we're gonna draft something new and get something ready, um and it, it seems
like too, it's more palatable to the to you guys. I would much rather come to a consensus.
I think we're pretty far from a consensus at this point. Um So, you know, I think
just a question of, do we wanna, I mean, it sounds like we have 22 of you who could
live with number two. Um And you know, so the next draft, right? It's, it's, that's
what Josh is asking for direction on what to bring back is that, do we want them
to bring back a number two draft? Because there's some, at least a majority opinion
around that currently I don't want them to go to a ton of work, but, you know, it's,
that would be a very simple change, that particular option. Um, it doesn't address
though, however, we Commissioner Dean, the other ideas that you're bringing up around
the permit requirements and application requirements and conditions and other things
and this is just talking about the process for, could we do?
Which is what we're trying to do. Right. That was, that was the idea. So, but, but
I guess what I'm saying is if you want to talk about other things more, then we're
gonna have to schedule more time and get into that because we're, we're not unless
you want us to produce an ordinance that it's not gonna reflect these other ideas.
In which case you will, you'll be left hanging if you will, if we come back to you,
that it will be incomplete because it won't include other ideas that you're talking
about or thinking about. We had a 1030 for February 12 scheduled for continued deliberations.
And the idea behind that is that we would have an ordinance prepared ahead of that.
But if we're going to continue this discussion, I guess what I'm saying, it sounds
to me like we didn't get to, at least in what I'm hearing you say, Commissioner Dean,
we didn't get to where we wanted to get to perhaps today, which means that I think
we should schedule more time next week or not next week, the week after to just continue
the conversation unless I'm hearing something different, unless I'm hearing something
different. Um, but if you're, if you're landed on option two, we can draft that and
we can produce an, or that reflects that, but it won't have other changes in it because
I'm not clear about what other, what else we would change. Yeah. I would just love
to get to, to beef up language around um uh gear, responsibility for
gear, uh clean up of gear. Um And even if that's just for Gooey Duck, um I know in
general. Ok. So that's outside the scope of what we've been talking about for the
last couple of months, right? So we Lisa did, can we see, is there any chance Caroline,
we can see what Lisa posted there because we do have language around gear and it
and operations are responsible for it. So I guess we could, we could like you could,
especially if you stop sharing her screen. Ok. If you had something in mind, I guess
I should say. Um this is um I put in the chat a clean version of what you're seeing
here basically and this is just above the application requirements. So basically,
it is saying um that to minimize redundancy, the county shall accept supporting permit
applications and studies required by state and federal agencies that fulfill one
or more of the requirements in the subsections A through EB which is basically that
table. Right. I'm sorry, I, I was thinking Lisa of that part. There absolutely is
a part in here where we talk about gear and you're responsible for making sure nothing
basically escapes your control. Sure. There, there is language in there. Now, whether
like in the page 150 ish, there's a number of references but um I could see just
wanting to beef that up a little bit. Um And, you know, again, I think uh applicants
are doing that in other um in other applications. And so I'm just trying to think
what's the most practical way to call out what has already been, I guess what, what
we can commit to doing. Um If you're comfortable with that is we could commit to
researching the nationwide permit process where they're at right now. What the current
policy from a federal standpoint is around gear and we could propose to strengthen
that section, proposed language as part of the next iteration just based on this
direction. And then it'd be up to you to see whether that met your met um the concern
that you're expressing or whether you would have phrased it some other way. Um It
does make that last. We just have to decide whether we're gonna try to do that all
in the next time it actually comes before you and, and you want to do that kind of
level of um evaluation of the language like on the spot that particular day or we
want to have a different day and then come back. Yeah. And I think the scope of it
is fairly limited. Um, I will say to it, I'm happy to research this, the, um, the
Pacific Shellfish Growers Association also have a B MP that relate to um to derelict
gear. So, you know, I, I don't think we're reinventing the wheel here but I would
just love to have it called out more specifically. Um.
Mhm. Because the brain plastics is a, a big concern of mine.
I just think we're a little soft on currently. Commissioners. Um, Amy did do some
research on debris with aquaculture. I don't know if you, for the three counties.
I have her results that I can pull up on screen if you would like and she can walk
through it. I'm checking in with staff to see if there's security to keep the doors
open. Yeah, it sounds like we wanna talk about it more. I, I really gotta hit the
road too. So I don't, can, can you send that Lisa? And maybe we can take up this,
this, this new attack on the fifth or whatever, the Monday first Monday in February
12. Well, no, no, the one before that
I was suggesting that we haven't gotten to where I thought we might get today. So
I am suggesting that we go on the fifth and the T 12 and we might in the twelveth
might actually move to another time because we still need time to develop. That.
Barbara has hinted this jury trial is going to interfere with her 130 on the fifth.
That works for everyone.
Sounds good.
Ok. All right. Thank you all. Sorry. We went long. Um, really appreciate your work
on this. All right. Anything for the good of the order right now, we are late for
my 430. Sorry recording stopped.