Kittitas County residents say 'no' to wells agreement

CLE ELUM, Wash. — A standing-room-only crowd of more than 100 people packed the Upper Kittitas County District Court in Cle Elum Wednesday night to tell Kittitas County commissioners what they think of a proposed memorandum of agreement (MOA) with the state Department of Ecology.

The verdict: They don’t like it — and they don’t want the commissioners to sign it.

On July 16, 2009, the DOE ordered a moratorium on the drilling and use of new wells in the Upper County, which has halted residential development in rural areas. The move came after two years of discussion between the county and DOE failed to produce an agreement on new rules that would have required mitigation for the drilling of wells in certain rural areas.

But landowners, some of whom had already invested in wells that weren’t currently in use, argued that the move caught them by surprise and left their land virtually useless.

Under the proposed agreement, the current DOE-imposed moratorium on drilling and use of new wells would be lifted for a 150-day period beginning March 26. During that time, landowners would have an opportunity to finish projects, occupy their homes and begin using their water domestically. At the end of that period, a new well moratorium would begin in the Upper County. A new project would require the purchase of a water right to mitigate or offset the water withdrawn from the well.

DOE presented the proposal as a chance to give landowners another building season to complete projects and the DOE more time to initiate a water “banking” program to provide water rights that could be purchased for mitigation. DOE also said the proposal responds to complaints that the emergency moratorium imposed last year caught landowners by surprise and was adopted without advance notice or a chance for the public to fully participate in rule-making.

But the proposed 150-day window of opportunity seemed less like an opportunity and more like a useless gesture to many in the audience Wednesday night.

Opponents want a longer period of time, clearer delineation on the rules that will apply and a water bank in place before the commissioners sign off on anything.

A steady stream of speakers, many of them landowners frustrated by their ability to move forward in building homes or developing their property, spoke of lost dreams and economic harm.

Jack Jensen, a Teanaway landowner who is a member of the Citizens Alliance for Property Rights, said the moratorium has made it impossible for him “to give” his property away. Kittitas County Citizens Alliance for Property Rights is a group that has warned that a permanent moratorium will further devastate the economy and cause property values to plummet further. The “vast majority of affected owners” would not be helped by the MOA, he told the commissioners in comments that were echoed by a number of other speakers.

Greg Oakes, chief lending officer for Cashmere Valley Bank, concurred. The 150-day time period for completing projects was not long enough to convince lenders to make loans, he said.

“With all due respect (to the DOE),” he said, “there’s a little bit of a trust issue going on.” Until specifics are more clearly spelled out, that won’t change, he said and cautioned the commissioners against signing the agreement.

Cle Elum’s Jim Sanders said while developers poised to quickly finish projects may welcome the 150-day window they’ll “flee the county” once they’re done. Landowners who can’t afford to build now will be left with land they can’t build on, he said, predicting lawsuits against the county.

Another speaker, Rod Jovanovich, told the commissioners they should not sign the MOA and that more needs to be done to develop ways to make betters of use available resources. Among the possibilities he suggested was lining part of the Kittitas Reclamation District (KRD) canals.

Several speakers warned of the trickle down effect of a continued moratorium, not just on landowners and business, but on the loss of tax base in the Upper County as land values plummet. That will impact government agencies, including the county, they said.

Mark Kirkpatrick of Encompass Engineering told the board, “Do I think the MOA is better than a moratorium? Yes.” That said, he didn’t like being put under the conditions, he said.

“Not enough time and energy has been put into finding better solutions,” he told the commissioners.

One man, a senior citizen, told the commissioners that older area residents — with less time to recoup losses — had been hammered economically, their investments devastated by the recession, their land value eroded by the moratorium.

“If your intention is to hurt us more, sign this,” he told the commissioners. Another speaker said, “This is nuts. The DOE is wrong. You have to make it right. Don’t sign this thing.”

Gary Kurtz of Windermere Real Estate in Cle Elum painted a portrait of the grim reality of the real estate market in numbers.

Three years ago, he told the commissioners, the office had 365 transactions and nearly 200 were vacant land transactions. “This past year we were right in the neighborhood of 30, 170 less vacant land transactions in our office alone,” Kurtz said. Like Oakes, he told the commissioners the 150-day time period was not sufficient, that banks would not finance loans and the property owners would still not be able to sell their property.

But Cordy Cooke, a member of the Roslyn City Council, said the MOA leveled the playing field. The city of Roslyn had been forced to purchase and transfer water rights because the water rights it held, dating back to the early 1900s, were junior to those of some other parties and during drought years the city risked having its water curtailed. That purchase and transfer process, which took a number of years, has just been finalized.

Tom Ring, hydrologist for the Yakama Nation Water Resources Program, told the commissioners that if the 150-day window is not mitigated the Yakama Nation does not support the MOA.

Melissa Bates, president of Aqua Permanente, the small advocacy group that petitioned the state in the fall of 2007 to halt the drilling of new groundwater wells in the Upper County, also spoke.

“We do not agree with a 150-day free-for-all,” she said.

The commissioners continued the hearing until Tuesday, Feb. 2, at 6 p.m. at District Court in Cle Elum when they are scheduled to make a decision on the proposed MOA. Written comments may be submitted to the commissioners until 5 p.m. Friday at 205 W. Fifth Ave., Suite 108, Ellensburg, 98926.