Officials from South Snohomish County cities would like to have a dialogue with their counterparts in county government.
They even invited the five present county council members, two council members-elect and the county executive to join them for a little dinner and discussion this past Thursday night at the Lynnwood Convention Center. Also on the guest list were all of the state lawmakers from South County legislative districts, other dignitaries and the public.
According to organizing officials, nine out of 14 invited lawmakers said they would come.
And the county elected officials? Zero.
It’s hard to have a conversation by yourself, and if it happens too often, some sort of diagnosis might be in order. In this case, South County cities officials can be excused if they are already feeling a bit crazed.
The whole point of the Thursday meeting is a pervasive feeling among city officials that Snohomish County government isn’t addressing the needs of their cities. To be charitable, city officials want to make sure their message is at least being heard, if not heeded and so, the dinner party.
The rawest rub points between the cities and county come where growth meets planning, specifically, whose planning.
Ever since the 1990 state Growth Management Act, the general rule of thumb has been that if it looks and acts like a city, it should be a city and anything else is the county’s problem. As part of the law, cities outlined areas they’d be likely to annex at some point in the future. Just when that point arrives would in large part be determined by growth.
At various points over the past decade or so, Snohomish County has been one of the fastest growing counties in the country. County officials had to direct all those people somewhere and most of the time that somewhere was to the edges of the cities, in those likely-to-be-annexed areas.
Now, when it comes to new development, city planners and electeds spend a lot of time debating such things as neighborhood character and fire and police services. At the county level, the checklist can be quite a bit shorter. The result is cities are faced with annexing areas that wouldn’t otherwise meet city standards.
Another growth-related issue is traffic. For example, county-approved growth has pushed 164th Street SW/SE to its designed capacity. While the county council recently stopped short of making that an official declaration, area residents trying to get home need no such imprimatur to become believers.
The irony of this battle between governments is that in South County, with relatively little unincorporated area and state law designed to end up with even less, the same voters are choosing their representatives to both agencies. The city and county electeds are (or should be) serving the same constituents.
Perhaps the county elected officials had holiday-season calendar conflicts this past Thursday. Regardless, the dialogue must start with South County city officials and voters should demand it.
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