SENATE BILL REPORT

                  SHB 2394

              As Reported By Senate Committee On:

           Government Operations, February 23, 1996

Title:  An act relating to authorized uses for master planned resorts.

Brief Description:  Revising master planned resorts.

Sponsors:  House Committee on Government Operations (originally sponsored by Representatives Reams, Buck, Sheldon, Honeyford, Delvin, Thompson and McMahan).

Brief History:

Committee Activity:  Government Operations:  2/15/96, 2/23/96 [DP].

SENATE COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS

Majority Report:  Do pass.

  Signed by Senators Haugen, Chair; Goings, Hale, Heavey, McCaslin and Winsley.

Staff:  Diane Smith (786-7410)

Background:  Enactment of the Growth Management Act (GMA) in 1990 and 1991 established a partnership between the state and local governments to manage growth in a comprehensive manner.  Various planning requirements and goals to guide county and city actions are established by statute in the GMA.  Each county planning under all GMA requirements must designate urban growth areas within which urban growth shall be encouraged and outside of which growth may occur only if it is non-urban in nature.  As part of its urban growth area designations, a county may authorize new fully contained communities to be located outside of what it designates as urban growth areas.

Under certain circumstances, counties planning under the GMA may permit master planned resorts which may constitute urban growth outside of urban growth areas.  A master planned resort is defined as a self-contained and fully integrated planned unit development, in a setting of significant natural amenities, with primary focus on destination resort facilities.  Such facilities are to consist of short-term visitor accommodations associated with a range of developed on-site indoor or outdoor recreational facilities.  A master planned resort may include other residential uses within its boundaries, but only if the residential uses are integrated into and support the on-site recreational nature of the resort.

Summary of Bill:  Current law is amended by broadening the definition of a master planned resort in relation to the Growth Management Act.  As a result, the development restrictions in the master planned resorts located outside of designated urban growth areas are relaxed.  Specifically, the new definition requires master planned resorts to include destination resort facilities as a part of a proposed development, instead of requiring them to be the primary focus.  The list of uses that may be included in the master planned resort is extended to conference facilities and commercial activities supporting the nature of the resort.  Rather than having to support the resort, these other uses must be consistent with the nature of the resort.  A county is allowed to allocate a portion of its 20-year population projection to the number of permanent residents within the master planned resort.

Appropriation:  None.

Fiscal Note:  Not requested.

Effective Date:  The bill contains an emergency clause and takes effect immediately.

Testimony For:  Due to an anomaly created by the Growth Management Hearings Board, a resort community begun 28 years ago with $20 million so far invested in infrastructure, is without an identity under the GMA.  This bill is needed to make GMA workable.

Testimony Against:  This is another stealth amendment to GMA which will allow megasubdivisions with pinball galleries.

Testified:  Jerry Harper, Harper & Assoc. (pro); Greg McCarry, Port Ludlow (pro); Tom Goeltz, Davis Wright Tremain (pro); Dave Williams, Assn. of WA Cities (pro); Gerald Steel, Friends of Skagit County (con); Joseph Elfelt, written testimony.