Snohomish County wants trash if Bothell grows

Published 10:39 pm Monday, May 18, 2009

BOTHELL — A cross-county fight over who gets Bothell’s trash might derail the city’s efforts to annex 22,000 new residents.

The Snohomish County Council voted 4-0 on Monday to oppose the annexation, unless Snohomish County continues to handle trash from the area in question. King County officials say an agreement with Bothell from the late 1980s entitles it to all the city’s waste.

“It does seem to give King County an awful lot of control over what happens in Snohomish County,” Councilman Dave Gossett said ahead of the council’s vote.

Snohomish County officials contend that nearly $2 million in annual garbage-related revenue is at stake, though their King County counterparts say the figure is much lower.

Aside from the garbage issue, the council is largely supportive of the annexation, and Gossett said he regretted having to oppose the effort after so much work.

Bothell’s current population of just over 30,000 is divided almost evenly between the two counties. The addition would mean the majority of Bothell residents would now be north of the county line. City officials have said they think Snohomish County should keep handling trash from those areas.

The current dispute shows why state and local officials have grown wary of extending city limits across county lines.

“It’s just this kind of issue that makes cross-border annexation problematic,” said Peter Camp, Snohomish County’s executive director.

Waste Management, a private company, currently handles trash for Bothell and the unincorporated areas. It pays a fee to drop trash off at county waste transfer stations.

Should the annexation go forward, customers’ rates in the affected areas would go down, as they almost always do when homes are absorbed into a city or town, said Susan Robinson, a Waste Management spokeswoman. Afterward, bills would come from the city.

King County officials argue that they could better serve the annexation area because their tipping fees — money charged to dump trash at transfer stations — are $95 per ton, compared with $105 per ton in Snohomish County. That, they maintain, would translate into lower rates for trash pickup.

Logan Harris, public affairs manager for King County solid waste, said the 1988 agreement with Bothell will remain valid until 2028. King County already accepts waste from a small area of Bothell inside Snohomish County.

“Our position is that we don’t feel we have a dispute,” Harris said.

Snohomish County officials say the agreement predates Washington’s current growth policies.

Council Chairman Mike Cooper did not vote Monday because he was out of town on county business. But he and County Executive Aaron Reardon did send a joint letter about the issue last week to King County Interim Executive Kurt Triplett.

While saying they wanted to continue to work toward a solution, they noted that “our current negotiations are at an impasse.”

Snohomish County estimates that garbage from the proposed annexation area generates $1.9 million in annual solid-waste revenue. That’s a significant portion of the $46 million in garbage fees they expected to bring in countywide this year.

They were counting on the money when they upgraded the southwest waste transfer station in Mountlake Terrace back in 1999. Without it, they’ll have to cut costs or raise rates, Camp said.

The state’s Boundary Review Board is scheduled to take up the issue on May 28 and is likely to reach a decision within the following weeks. If the board moves the annexation forward, voters could decide its fate in November.

Noah Haglund: 425-339-3465, nhaglund@heraldnet.com.