A statewide "smart growth" group will fight the Snohomish County Council’s rezone of farmland at Island Crossing, officials with the organization said Thursday.
The challenge is the latest chapter in car dealer Dwayne Lane’s quest to move his Arlington auto lot next to I-5 at Island Crossing.
Lane has been trying since the mid-1990s to get his land east of Arlington rezoned from agriculture to commercial uses. The County Council on Wednesday cleared the way for the proposal by overturning County Executive Bob Drewel’s rejection of the rezone.
Officials from 1000 Friends of Washington, a group that fights urban development from consuming farm and forest lands, criticized the County Council for approving the rezone Thursday. The group said it would challenge the decision in an appeal.
The group is also asking the Central Puget Sound Growth Management Hearings Board to expedite its review of the rezone so Lane can’t begin developing he land before the board weighs in on the rezone.
The County Council violated the state’s Growth Management Act, the law that protects farms and forests from development, when it approved the 110.5-acre rezone, said John Zilavy, legal director for 1000 Friends.
"The county has blatantly violated the GMA here by converting productive agricultural land into urban land," Zilavy said. "Both the hearings board and the Superior Court have previously found this land should remain in agriculture."
Supporters of the zoning change said they weren’t surprised by the challenge.
"We welcome the lawsuit," said Gary Nelson, County Council chairman.
Nelson said Arlington, which asked the county to expand the city’s urban growth area so the rezoned land could be annexed someday, would join the county’s defense of its decision. Property owners in the area also were expected to defend the decision.
"I have known this property most of my life," Nelson said, adding that the rezone area does not have long-term commercial significance in farming.
"You cannot grow enough of any crop and produce it and sell it and pay for the property taxes," Nelson said.
Zilavy disagreed.
"Just saying it doesn’t make it so," he said.
The land has been used to grow crops in the past, Zilavy said, and state growth laws don’t dictate that only high-value crops must be grown on farmland for it to have long-term commercial significance.
The character and the quality of the soils on the property have not changed since the last time the state said the land should stay in farming, he said.
The rezone has become a poster child of sorts for vanishing farmland since Lane reintroduced the idea in 2002. The rezone has since been opposed by the county’s Agricultural Advisory Board and the Snohomish County Farm Bureau. And others have said the land, in the flood plain of the Stillaguamish River, shouldn’t be developed.
But Lane said his property didn’t flood earlier this week, when floodwaters flowed over the banks of the Stillaguamish River. And he expected 1000 Friends to challenge the rezone.
"It’s not a surprise. They’re against everything and they appeal everything," Lane said. "I guess we’re just ready to face it when it comes up."
Reporter Brian Kelly: 425-339-3422 or kelly@heraldnet.com.
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