BLAINE PLANNING CONCERNS

 

  • This policy appears to narrow wetland buffers relative to Ordinance 09‑2729 / SMP Appendix A without going through the legally required channels: no Planning Commission review, no City Council adoption, and no Ecology SMP amendment process.  
  • In practice, staff now treat roads, rail lines, or other hardened surfaces as the “end” of the wetland buffer, and treat the upland side as outside any regulated buffer if a consultant asserts “functional isolation.”  
  • Under the existing CAO/SMP text, those upland areas would normally still be within the mapped buffer unless reduced through the formal buffer‑reduction process (with criteria, findings, and mitigation).  

    This is alarming because it:  
  • Delegates major policy choices to staff interpretation with no public oversight.  
  • Lacks a documented best‑available‑science basis specific to Blaine’s hydrology, wetlands, and CARA.  
  • Effectively weakens buffers and reduces environmental protection (wetland setbacks, net habitat loss standards, groundwater protection and recharge) while pretending the underlying regulations have not changed.  
  • The City is using the 2015 Shoreline Master Program Submittal Checklist (prepared by the Community Development Director) as if it were being meaningfully followed, but project‑level SEPA checklists and decisions do not show consistent use of those standards or a honest “no net loss” analysis.  
  • The City’s implementation of CAO/SMP requirements—particularly for CARA, wetlands, and cumulative impacts—does not match what is promised in the checklist and adopting ordinances.  
  • In at least one CARA‑related PUD matter, the City issued a DNS without adequate hydrogeologic analysis, without integrating best available science, and without correcting obvious misstatements in the developer’s materials.  

    Again, these points are allegations supported by documents and expert review in our SEPA appeal; they underscore the need for independent scrutiny by the Planning Commission and the County.  
  • City staff have repeatedly failed to enforce shoreline and critical‑areas conditions, including a VCA where no follow‑up monitoring or enforcement occurred.  
  • Several citizen complaints and coding infractions have been filed (including through DOE’s ERTS system) related to shoreline and critical areas violations, with little or no corrective action by Planning.  
  • The overall pattern is developer‑driven flexibility, ad hoc exceptions, and non‑enforcement of conditions, in conflict with the City’s own adopted rules.  

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