The state Department of Ecology will approve Island County’s updated Shoreline Master Plan within the next two months if the county agrees to make 16 pages of changes, it told the press Friday.
Those changes, though numerous, are relatively small, acknowledged David Pater, a shoreline planner for the department.
“It’s not unusual to have this number of changes, and a lot of them were generated by the county itself,” Pater said Friday. “Most of the changes are minor.”
The department approved the most important change — temporarily banning fish farming from the island’s waters — earlier this month.
Among the 40 remaining changes, one eliminates aquaculture districts, which were established in the county during the 1980s.
“In practice, the districts have not facilitated better resource management,” the department said.
Another change reduces shoreline setbacks and marine or lake buffers, but not steep-slope buffers. New developments and activities must now avoid or minimize blocking public views of the shoreline. A new, highly detailed set of rules governs commercial geoduck aquaculture, providing among other things that the county must give public notice to all property owners within 300 feet of proposed geoduck aquaculture boundaries.
In addition to the mandatory changes, the department provided 13 recommended changes. Among them are that anyone restoring an environmentally sensitive area must post a bond, to be refunded upon the project’s completion.
If the county agrees with all the required changes, the department will issue a final approval letter, and the plan will become effective shortly thereafter. If not, the department must evaluate the county’s objections.
“We hope the plan will get finally approved and will be in place within the next 1.5 months,” Pater said.
Island County has more than 200 miles of shoreline. The new plan includes environmental designations, buffers and setbacks intended to reflect current land use and conditions, aquaculture policies and regulations, and standards for residential development in beach and canal communities, the department said on its website
The state Shoreline Management Act, adopted in 1971, requires cities and counties to create Shoreline Management Plans. Under a 2003 change to the Act, the plans must be reviewed every eight years. Island County’s plan hadn’t been reviewed since it was created in 1976. The review process began in 2010.
