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Home / Washington Business - May/June 2004 / Growth Management: Finding Suitable Industrial Sites Outside Urban Areas in Washington |
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Growth Management: Finding Suitable Industrial Sites Outside Urban Areas in Washington |
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Written On: May/June 2004 |
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Written By: by Nancy Bainbridge Rogers |
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Under Washington’s Growth Management Act, residential, commercial and industrial development is directed to Urban Growth Areas. Urban Growth Areas are primarily incorporated cities and towns. Industrial and manufacturing firms can have difficulty finding suitable, large locations to build plants within the existing Urban Growth Areas of the state. When a manufacturer cannot build in Washington, then Washington loses substantial investment and employment opportunities. Moreover, this Growth Management directive to send urban development to limited geographic areas leaves rural areas with little opportunity for economic growth.
While some manufacturing is currently being conducted overseas, there remain companies interested in manufacturing on the West Coast and particularly in Washington. Reasons for continuing to manufacture in Washington vary widely but include proximity to existing suppliers and end users, and the prohibitive cost or potential delays associated with shipping certain products from overseas.
In the mid-1990s, the Washington Legislature recognized these issues and amended the Growth Management Act to allow individual industrial users to locate in rural areas. It should be noted that there are also provisions in the Growth Management Act allowing so-called “Limited Areas of More Intensive Rural Development” or LAMIRDs, which can include infill and existing businesses, industries, retail and service outlets and the like. While a LAMIRD can be a useful tool to assure economic independence for rural areas, this article focuses only on opportunities for large industry, and not these other types of rural development.
Under the terms of RCW 36.70A.365, the Growth Management Act allows a single industrial user to locate a “Major Industrial Development” outside of an Urban Growth Area. This is often called the “365” process. To qualify as a Major Industrial Development, a project must be for a specific manufacturing, industrial, or commercial business that requires a parcel of land so large that no suitable parcels are available within an Urban Growth Area, or a natural resource-based industry requiring a location near agricultural, forest or mineral resource lands. A Major Industrial Development cannot be for the purpose of retail commercial development or multi-tenant office parks. For example, a large manufacturing plant that requires substantial acreage with certain environmental and geographic features (e.g. topography, low groundwater, specialized utilities or transportation infrastructure) can utilize the 365 process to locate outside an urban growth area. To be successful requires showing the county in which the desired plant site is located that:
• New infrastructure is provided for and/or applicable impact fees are paid.
• Transit-oriented site planning and traffic demand management programs are implemented.
• Buffers are provided between the major industrial development and adjacent non-urban areas.
• Environmental protection including air and water quality has been addressed and provided for.
• Development regulations are established to ensure that urban growth will not occur in adjacent non-urban areas.
• Provision is made to mitigate adverse impacts on designated agricultural lands, forest lands, and mineral resource lands.
• The plan for the major industrial development is consistent with the county's development regulations established for protection of critical areas.
• An inventory of developable land has been conducted and the county has determined and entered findings that land suitable to site the major industrial development is unavailable within the urban growth area. Priority shall be given to applications for sites that are adjacent to or in close proximity to the urban growth area.
A county is also free to impose its own additional criteria on a proposed 365 process for a Major Industrial Development. Importantly, final approval of a 365 application for a Major Industrial Development is considered an amendment to the county’s comprehensive plan and designates the plant site as a new Urban Growth Area, limited to use by that plant. By virtue of being designated as an Urban Growth Area, many of the Growth Management Act’s restrictions on development on rural lands disappear. For example, water service can be provided to an Urban Growth Area, which could not be provided to rural lands.
This process also allows the affected manufacturer to work with counties to craft development regulations that will directly apply to the project site. Thus, requirements such as setbacks, building height, hours of operation and the like can be tailored specifically to the precise industry need.
Despite its appeal — the ability to locate industry in Washington outside an existing city, and to craft tailored development regulations — few have sought to use these opportunities to date. Today, Lewis County is processing an application for a large float glass plant. With a favorable decision on that application anticipated later this year, it is more likely that others will follow suit.
On a related front, many counties are also allowed to designate a bank of up to two locations for multi-user major industrial activities. This process also has proved difficult to navigate, in large part because it was unclear whether a county could simply designate a land bank area on a comprehensive plan map, or whether the county was required to act like an industrial developer and to design and build necessary roads, utilities and other infrastructure prior to finalizing the land bank designation. During the 2004 legislative session, the allowance for county designation of land banks was simplified. Now, the Growth Management Act clearly provides that a county’s decision to designate a land bank area is simply a planning level decision, and that subsequent industrial users interested in locating a new facility within the land bank are charged with the expense of providing the necessary infrastructure.
In short, large industry interested in locating to Washington, but experiencing some difficulty finding a suitable site, should consider exploring opportunities granted by the 365 process.
Nancy Bainbridge Rogers is a Land Use Partner at Cairncross & Hempelmann, in Seattle. Ms. Rogers has extensive experience advising local and national companies regarding planning, feasibility analyses, and permit and entitlement acquisition for development throughout Washington state.
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