For most people, the term “Comprehensive Plan” doesn’t exactly inspire excitement. It can be easy to dismiss the process of updating a county or city’s comprehensive plan as dull, but at RE Sources we know that these plans, which integrate the distinct planning processes for a variety land uses and matters of local governance (agricultural land preservation, zoning for heavy industry, housing, recreation infrastructure, shoreline management, etc.), are the roadmaps our communities follow for a generation’s worth of growth. Our job is to help everyday people in our communities participate in the public process to update these plans. After all, this is the future of our very own families, livelihoods, and special places we’re talking about.
Skagit County’s 2025 Comprehensive Plan was adopted on June 23rd, wrapping up a year-long public participation process. The Skagit Comp Plan outlines the priorities and goals for the next 20 years of growth planning. The plan is mandated by the state Growth Management Act to be updated every decade. This round was special, because for the first time (following recent state legislation) Skagit County established a new Climate Element into the plan. Incorporating climate realities into their 20-year growth strategies, the County is moving to face the mounting impacts, acknowledge risks and mitigate the causes of climate change.
Though RE Sources has been active in Skagit County for decades, over the course of the past year we became better connected to many Skagitonians who share our values and goals, and gained a stronger understanding of the local governments and their policymaking dynamics.
Alongside local place-based organizations, active community members, committed local stakeholders and the Swinomish Tribe, we followed attentively through twelve months of plan-making and weighed in at several junctures.
Priorities
Our priorities for the Skagit Comprehensive Plan center on creating resilience in the natural and human systems of the county and include:
- Protect the region’s rural land base from sprawl
- Limit development in areas at risk of future floods, sea level rise, and coastal erosion
- Decrease the amount of pavement and restore ecological functions to the landscape
- Plan for a just clean energy transition
We reached out to hundreds of community members in Skagit County to inform them of the process, hear their concerns about how and where Skagit should grow and urged them to get involved. In the end people turned out to attend public hearings and sent in written comments to County staff and commissioners and outlining their vision for the next 20 years of growth planning. And that engagement made a direct difference in the quality of planning policies adopted into the comp plan and in helping people understand that local actions matter.
Skagit resident Andrea D. was one of several community members we helped inform about the public process tied to Comprehensive Plan updates. Andrea noted, “I have depended on the research of RE Sources to back public testimony. I know it to be dependable and well researched.”
In the course of one year, over a thousand public comments were collected through a combination of venues: via email, at public hearings in-person and remotely, at Open Houses, through an online survey, in stakeholder interviews and through advisory boards. The participants overwhelmingly supported proactive policies to address climate change. The majority of public comments throughout the process supported pro-environment policies and pushed the County to go further than they were willing.
The County has made progress and gained information through new studies, including a climate impact vulnerability assessment, countywide greenhouse gas inventory, a riparian buffer analysis, a housing needs assessment, as well as many external studies and reports submitted through public comments.
While not all of our top priorities were incorporated or addressed fully here are some key wins:
- The new Comp Plan includes a brand new Climate Element, with forward-thinking planning guidelines for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and adapting to the impacts of climate change, particularly sea level rise and hazardous flooding.
- Measures to add more affordable housing, concentrated in urban growth areas, and preventing encroachment onto farms, forests and natural resource lands.
- The plan includes new policies that particularly support the expansion of safe and affordable housing for farmworkers, based on input from local farmworker advocates at Community to Community (C2C).
A few key items that are missing from the plan that we will continue to press for:
- Creating an Environmental Advisory Board and a Climate Planning Advisory Board.
- Adopting “net ecological gain” standards, going beyond required “no net loss” policies, restoring ecosystem functions and promoting biodiversity.
- Enacting development regulations that support resilient, sustainable utility infrastructure and a just clean energy transition.
- Adapting to expanded floodplains, aligning zoning and land use responsibly.
- Updating the Shoreline Management Program, to adequately account for sea-level rise.
- Promoting responsible forestry and improving watershed health.
Our work is not over! After all, Comprehensive Plans are only as good as their implementation.
I have depended on the research of RE Sources to back public testimony. I know it to be dependable and well researched” – Skagit County community member Andrea D.
What’s Next?
Attention now turns to two more critical pieces of growth management planning in need of integration and updating. The Skagit County Critical Areas Ordinance is currently out for public comment through July 28th. A critical areas ordinance is a set of local regulations that protect critical ecosystem functions and manage growth in natural hazard areas. A strong CAP is needed now more than ever to create resilience for our communities in the face of increasing climate impacts like floods, rising sea levels, wildfires, and drought. Like comprehensive plans CAOs are updated periodically and public engagement is integral to the process. To make sure you are part of the process follow us on social media and sign up to receive action alerts so you know when and how to make your voice heard.
The largest municipalities within Skagit are still in the thick of their Comp Plan updates, particularly the City of Anacortes, which just released a full draft of its 2025 Comprehensive Plan for public review. The City is accepting written comments running up to a public hearing on August 27th, and thereafter the City Council will adopt the amended Comp Plan by end of year. Anacortes is an important maritime destination, and we are thankful to see local officials there showing exceptional commitment to progressive climate-forward planning.
During the process the County Commissioners also adopted a reorganized, updated Unified Development Code. A UDC is a document that combines various land-use regulations, such as zoning and subdivision regulations, into one comprehensive code. Further updates will be necessary to truly align the county’s regulations with the goals and policies of the 2025 Comp Plan.
In the newly adopted Code, an important (and broadly defined) category of land use has been outright prohibited in all of Skagit County: major regional utility development, which definitionally “Includes, but is not limited to, facilities and services that generate, transport, process, or store water, sewage, solid waste, electrical energy, communications and pipelines for fuel, oil, natural gas, and petroleum products.” Utility developments classified as “minor” and “major” are still allowed, but the County will not authorize new projects that are “designed to serve a region” (meaning the scale extends beyond Skagit County). The distinctions here are, of course, subject to interpretation and dispute.
There are numerous existing facilities in Skagit County that seem to meet the definition of “major regional utility development,” for instance the hydroelectric dams that power Seattle through high-voltage transmission lines. The two oil refineries at March Point, as well as major oil and gas transmission pipelines also seem to be encompassed in this category.
The City Anacortes land use code does, however, allow petroleum refineries in its Urban Growth Area (UGA) that includes the March Point industrial zone. Although it falls outside City limits, March Point is subject to Anacortes Municipal Code as well as the Skagit County Code. Meaning, we still have our work cut out for us to integrate and outline a clear path forward for climate resilience and community health and safety in Skagit County.
We remain committed to staying engaged with our partners and supporters to put these policies in action on the ground to benefit the people and ecosystems of Skagit County toward the broader goal of building a climate resilient Northwest Washington.
Stay tuned for ways to engage in these next steps to make sure your voice is heard!