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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2025-04-08 6:00 PM - Planning Commission - Minutes KITTITAS COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION MINUTES Courthouse RM 201 , ELLENSBURG Regular Meeting TUESDAY 6: 00 PM April 8, 2025 Board members present: Bruce Coe, Joseph Pearson, Warren Taylor, Scott Carlson, Pat Deneen, and Judith Jackson. Not present : Bill Hinkle Others : Chad Bala. Jamey Ayling, Jeremy Johnston and Jessica Miller and no (0)members of the public. Meeting was called to order at 6: 00 P.M. CALL TO ORDER - Roll Call CITIZEN COMMENTS (1 min. time limit) There were no citizen comments . APPROVAL OF MINUTES COMMISSIONER DENNEEN moved to approve the March 11, 2025 minutes . COMMISSIONER PEARSON seconded. Discussion - none . Motion passed 6-0 . NEW BUSINESS DISCUSSION - SHORT-TERM RENTAL SURVEY DATA LONG RANGE PLANNER JEREMY JOHNSTON provided a brief history of the Short-Term Rental Committee . The committee was formed, per direction from the Board of County Commissioners and a resolution, to decide if the county should pursue regulations on short-term rentals . In February 2025, CDS issued a community survey to better understand the community' s sentiment regarding short-term rental regulations . The survey ran through Survey Monkey, for 60 days and concluded at the beginning of April 2025 . CDS received 895 responses during that timeframe . A condensed version of the survey results has been provided to the Planning Commissioners in their binders . The primary goal of the survey was to determine whether or not regulations should be considered in Kittitas County. The survey also included questions to allow the committee to better understand the issues from different perspectives and to gather useful information, should the county commissioners decide to move forward with the development of draft regulations . 2025-4-8 MINUTES 1 Discussion occurred regarding the survey questions . The primary question was question 11, which asked if the community member was in support of regulations . The responses show a 60/40 split in favor of some type of short-term rental regulations . Question 12 asked the respondents to specify what types of regulations they consider a priority. The commissioners reviewed the responses and concluded that a majority of the respondents were genuine and thoughtful in their answers . Discussion occurred regarding Question 20 and whether survey respondents had any additional comments or concerns regarding short-term rentals and Kittitas County that were not addressed in this survey. Results were compiled and provided in a supplemental document handed out at the meeting. COMMISSIONER JACKSON asked if the regulation listed on question 12 were the only regulations being considered. CDS DIRECTOR BALA stated the goal of the Short-Term Rental Committee will be to take a good look at the information received and start developing what types of regulations we want to see or no regulations . COMMISSIONER TAYLOR asked if we knew how many short-term rentals there are in Kittitas County. LONG RANGE PLANNER JOHNSTON stated at this time we do not, there have been committee members that have attempted to compile the numbers, the Chamber of Commerce has the AirDNA numbers but there are still gaps in the exact amount . Suncadia has their own requirement of short-term rentals under their development agreement from 1998 . CHAIR COE stated that after reviewing the responses, he feels that a sub area plan will be a great tool to use for this . He asked if there was any reason a Planning Commissioner couldn' t attend the Short-Term Rental Committee meeting. CDS DIRECTOR BALA stated he would look into this answer. LONG RANGE PLANNER JOHNSTON stated if there are questions or things the Planning Commission would like to ask or pass onto the STR Committee we would be able to do that . COMMISSIONER PEARSON stated that any potential regulations would come before the Planning Commission when completed for review and recommendation or not . COMMISSIONER TAYLOR asked if there is any discussion of when the State of Washington will regulate short-term rentals . CDS DIRECTOR BALA stated that if regulations are put in place, there will be a cost to it and potentially the need to hire additional staff like other counties have had to do . CDS DIRECTOR BAIA 2025-4-8 MINUTES 2 stated there are a lot of templates from other jurisdictions that are being reviewed and considered. These have been presented to the committee and will be revisiting what has worked and what hasn' t worked. LONG RANGE PLANNER JOHNSTON stated that one of the challenges is regarding Fire Life Safety inspections and the Fire Marshal, unless a short-term rentals are defined as commercial use, he currently can' t inspect it . The state definition of short-term rentals does not define it as commercial use . We currently adopted that state definition. This is a topic that will be discussed in the committee meeting. Handout of summarized STR regulations for Yakima and Chelan was provided at the meeting and discussed. COMMISSIONER CARLSON asked how do we generate more income through taxes with short-term rentals for the county? LONG RANGE PLANNER JOHNSTON stated that goal has not been defined yet . We are inquiring into what does the county want to see as a community, is this something that we think should be regulated, should we invest the resources in order to be able to adequately regulate or not . COMMISSIONER TAYLOR stated that the idea of this should not cost the county, the permit fees should cover the cost of the resources needed to fund the permit, personnel, etc. CDS DIRECTOR BALA stated we are in the process of getting clearer direction from the Board of County Commissioners and the survey gives us an idea of what the community sees as issues, how they feel about what to regulate, if anything, and how to regulate . CDS DIRECTOR BALA asked the Planning Commissioner if they would be open to a joint meeting for a general discussion about STR' s with the Board of County Commissioners . The Planning Commissioners feel that this topic is a big topic that would benefit from a discussion between the Planning Commission and the BoCC as it could potentially affect and impact a lot of citizens . It was suggested by CDS DIRECTOR BALA that potentially the Short-Term Rental Committee members attend also . The Short- Term Rental survey topic will be presented to the Board of County Commissioners at the next CDS Study Session. OLD BUSINESS There was no old business . OTHER BUSINESS - No Action to be taken 2025-4-8 MINUTES 3 CDS DIRECTOR BAIA stated CDS has had a series of meetings with regard to our periodic update and the population projections since our joint meeting last month. CDS went in front of COG on March 19th and got a recommendation of approval on the population projections, with the caveat that the cities get together and try to negotiate due to a concern regarding the population numbers . CDS will be taking the recommendation to approve those population projections to the Board of County Commissioners on April 15th. When approved we will be able to move forward on the county side to do our land capacity analysis . CDS had our Easton sub area open house, which was well attended. The entire Planning staff attended. The first open house in Ellensburg and Cle Elum is scheduled for May 17th. CDS DIRECTOR BALA shared that our critical areas code was challenged by the Yakima Nation. We are at the consistency review stage with negotiated changes between us and the Yakima Nation and how those agreed upon changes affect the rest of the code . CDS is in its two-year update and needs to look at the critical areas again as part of this process . We have Facet Northwest consulting taking a look at and doing a gap analysis of our critical areas code . We have also hired Facet separately outside of the periodic update to do a GIS analysis of site potential tree height . Discussion occurred. CHAIR COE concluded the Kittitas County Planning Commission public meeting. Meeting ended at 7 : 23 pm. 2025-4-8 MINUTES 4