Rezoning Paradise

One of Skagit County's most spectacular views is from the top of Fidalgo Island's Mount Erie. Looking southward across Lake Campbell, toward Deception Pass, we see a soothing panorama of farm, forest, lake, and islands.

But if a recent citizen advisory committee's rezoning recommendation prevails, this bucolic landscape will be lost, as more than a thousand additional homes are permitted in what is now a rural reserve zone. Eden will become McMansion suburbia.

Most residents of south Fidalgo Island don't want to see this happen. At a January open house sponsored by the Skagit County planning department, only 16 percent supported the idea of changing existing the 10-acre minimum lot size of the existing "rural reserve" zoning to the 2.5-acre minimum of "rural intermediate." Of the 197 people who filled out comment sheets, 83 percent were opposed.

Additionally, 75 percent supported a mission statement that says south Fidalgo Island should have the same character 20 years from now that it has today.

One reason we don't want a zoning change is because enough lots exist now, under current zoning, to accommodate the population growth expected over the next 20 years. About 4,500 people live on south Fidalgo now, and Skagit County projects about 900 additional residents, requiring 350 to 375 more homes, by 2025. Existing zoning is sufficient to provide 357 lots, the county says.

This moderate growth conforms to the state's Growth Management Act. While most people don't like growth anywhere, most agree with the philosophy of putting it in Skagit County's existing urban areas instead of rural sprawl. Such zoning saves money by concentrating roads and utilities, and protects the environment.

Despite this public sentiment, the citizen advisory committee of the South Fidalgo Island Subarea Plan has voted 6-1 to change the area's zoning from rural reserve to rural intermediate, increasing the projected number of home sites from 357 to 1,428.

Nor are they in a mood to compromise, even though they were warned by county planning staff that this change may violate the Growth Management Act. Committee member Tom Glade's motion for a five-acre minimum failed to even get a second.

Why? How can a 'citizen advisory committee' be so out of synch with its neighbors?

The answer is money. While some of us see heaven from the crest of Mount Erie, others see Fort Knox. Breaking a 10-acre parcel into four 2.5 acre ones could potentially triple its value, assessors say.

It's no secret that Skagit County commissioner Don Munks, who pushed for the subarea plan review and oversaw appointment of committee members, is friendly to real estate interests. In the 2004 campaign he received $2,500 from the Washington Association of Realtors and $1,500 from the Skagit Island Builders PAC, according to state public disclosure records. Fair enough.

But he also received contributions from at least four of the nine Subarea committee members he appointed, creating a group heavily weighted toward development. According to PDC records, member Bill Wooding, who owns more than 40 parcels on Fidalgo Island totaling nearly 160 acres and assessed at more than $13 million, contributed $500 to Munks' campaign through his Lake Erie Trucking company. At least 35 of Wooding's acres would be upzoned by this change.

Chairman Ed Goodman, with nearly eight acres near Lake Campbell, gave $100. Member Tom Stowe, a retired real estate appraiser, gave $100 through his wife, Patricia. Member Chuck Manning gave $50 through his Pacific Tank company.

Other committee members who would appear to have a potential financial stake in a rezone include Mike Trafton, whose extended family owns about 50 acres southwest of Lake Campbell, and Bill Turner, who owns property adjacent to Goodman and at least 18 acres on the slope of Mount Erie. Turner, a conservation-minded builder-developer, was removed after winning election to the Anacortes City Council. Another former committee member was Ken Howard, who owned 40 acres of Fidalgo Island forest land but sold it and resigned when he moved to Alaska.

In sum, at least three of those presently serving on the committee are substantial property holders with a potential stake in a rezone, two more who have resigned also have or had large holdings, and one worked in real estate. Two are retired and just one, Glade, is a clear environmentalist who serves on the board of Evergreen Islands.

This zoning change is short-sighted because retaining 10-acre zoning could prove to be its own win-win goldmine. As up to 2 million people move to Puget Sound over the next 20 years (a state projection), large intact properties between the Anacortes forest lands and Deception Pass State Park will be ever-more rare and enticing to big-money buyers from Seattle and California. Owners don't need to subdivide the landscape to cash in.

But if the rezone does happen, we neighbors will be stuck with the tax cost of handling water, waste, schools, crime and congestion from a thousand more homes.

That's why the South Fidalgo Subarea Plan is a grim warning of how things can go wrong. County staff did a good job of providing information and soliciting public opinion. Island sentiment is clear. But it means nothing if elected and appointed officials ignore it. We can only hope this rezone plan will be reversed - and that the same stacked political deck won't show up in other Skagit planning subareas as well.

-Bill Dietrich