Thurston County v. W. Wash. Growth Mgmt. Hearings Bd., 164 Wn. 2d 329

Summary

The Washington Supreme Court addresses the scope of Growth Management Hearings Board jurisdiction over challenges to county comprehensive-plan updates and urban growth area designations. It holds that challenges to failures to revise a plan may be brought when directly affected by new or substantively amended Growth Management Act provisions, and that challenges to urban growth area designations during a 10-year review may proceed when the population projection has changed. The court remands for further determinations concerning the use of a land-market supply factor and the adequacy of rural-density provisions.

Holdings

1. A party may challenge a county's failure to revise a comprehensive-plan provision after a seven-year update only when the provision is directly affected by a new or recently amended Growth Management Act requirement.
2. A party may challenge a county's failure to revise urban-growth-area designations after a ten-year update only if the Office of Financial Management population projection for the county has changed.
3. A county's urban-growth-area designation may not exceed the land necessary to accommodate the urban growth projected by the Office of Financial Management, plus a reasonable land-market-supply factor.
4. The Growth Management Act does not require a county to identify or justify its use of a land-market-supply factor in the comprehensive plan.
5. A Growth Management Hearings Board may not apply a bright-line percentage to determine whether a land-market-supply factor is reasonable. The factor must be evaluated under the clearly erroneous standard in light of the entire record and local circumstances.
6. A Growth Management Hearings Board may not use a bright-line rule to determine that densities greater than one dwelling unit per five acres are necessarily urban or subject them to increased scrutiny. Whether a density is rural is a fact-specific question based on local circumstances, rural character, and whether the density is characterized by urban growth.
7. Agricultural, forest, and mineral resource lands are not part of the rural element and therefore do not contribute to the variety of rural densities required within the rural element.
8. Innovative zoning techniques may be sufficient to provide a variety of rural densities, even if the underlying zoning classifications do not independently establish that variety.

Questions Presented

1. Whether a Growth Management Hearings Board may review a county's entire comprehensive plan after a seven-year update, including provisions the county did not revise.
2. Whether a party may challenge a county's failure to revise urban-growth-area designations after a ten-year review when the Office of Financial Management population projection has not changed.
3. Whether a county's urban-growth-area designation may exceed the land necessary to accommodate projected growth by a reasonable land-market-supply factor.
4. Whether a county must identify and justify its land-market-supply factor in the comprehensive plan.
5. Whether a Growth Management Hearings Board may apply a bright-line rule defining the maximum rural density or subject higher densities to increased scrutiny.
6. Whether resource lands and densities greater than one dwelling unit per five acres may be considered in determining whether the rural element provides a variety of rural densities.
7. Whether innovative zoning techniques may independently establish a variety of rural densities.

Disposition

reversed_and_remanded