PORT HADLOCK – A petition filed with the Western Washington Growth Management Hearings Board against Jefferson County could cut the 1,300-acre Port Hadlock-Irondale urban growth area in half.
The petition was filed by Irondale Community Action Neighbors and Nancy Dorgan, a former county resident who has moved out of the country.
It claims Jefferson County must tighten the boundary of the Port Hadlock-Irondale urban growth area, also called an UGA, because the county’s 20-year comprehensive plan shows no plans to hook up sewer connections for half the area.
About 2,500 people live within the urban growth area.
“The county now knows virtually for certain that it will not sewer about one half of the proposed UGA during the 20-year planning in the Comprehensive Plan, but it has refused to take action to reduce the size of the UGA to the area that it does propose to sewer during the life of the Comprehensive Plan,” said the petition.
The change would lop off the northern half of the urban growth area.
The Jefferson County Planning Commission decided Wednesday night to proceed with planning for the original boundaries, for the time being.
An urban growth area, as defined by the state Growth Management Act, is a defined area within which urban growth will be encouraged.
The county just completed a $450,000 study to determine an adequate sewer system, and defined which locations can be hooked up to a the sewer system, said Al Scalf, director of the county’s Department of Community Development.
Scarf said the county has spend more than $1 million on studies in the last decade, trying to come into compliance with the state Growth Management Act.
The urban growth area was declared non compliant in 2005 because it lacked an adequate plan for a sewer system.
The Growth Management Act was adopted by the state Legislature in 1990 to require state and local governments to identify and protect natural resources, designate urban growth areas and prepare comprehensive plans implemented through capital investments and development regulations.
