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KITTITAS COUNTY <br />DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC WORKS <br />PUBLIC WORKS — BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS <br />STUDY SESSION STAFF REPORT <br />STUDY SESSION DATE: March 27, 2017 <br />TOPIC: Public Works Road Variance Committee <br />ACTION REQUESTED: Direct Staff Prepare a Code Amendment Amending KCC <br />12.01.130 <br />LEAD STAFF: <br />Mark R. Cook <br />RECOMMENDATION: <br />Direct staff prepares a code amendment amending KCC 12.01.130 for Commission <br />review. <br />BREIFING SUMMARY: <br />• Currently, a variance committee considers road standard variance requests <br />• The committee is made up of Fire Marshall's Office, Community Development <br />representative, County Road Engineer and three citizen representatives <br />• Recent decisions are being made on simple majority without weight for <br />engineering considerations from Public Works <br />• Two of the citizen representatives are regularly recusing themselves from <br />decisions owing to conflicts of interest (engineering and construction) <br />• Increasingly, steep terrain in the upper county is prohibiting acquisition of <br />building lots as developers failed to consider road grade during the platting <br />process <br />• Numerous lots exist with non-compliant access issues <br />• Revising KCC 12.01.130 returns engineering decisions to Public Works <br />BACKGROUND: <br />During the past 18 months, numerous requests for variance to County road standards <br />have been managed by the Roads Variance Committee. On numerous occasions, Public <br />Works has dissented with the committee on decisions granting variance to our standards. <br />The committee functions on majority vote. In almost all circumstances, Public Works <br />has been more likely to adhere to standards than members of the committee. <br />Increasingly, it appears that emotion is driving committee decisions rather than <br />engineering science. In one recent example, a request to access a minor collector <br />roadway was denied by Public Works owing to the lack of safe sight distance. The <br />committee ruled in opposition to our denial for economic reasons as plead by the <br />applicate. We now have an access that does not meet minimum safety requirements. The <br />Page 1 of 3 <br />PUBLIC WORKS BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS WORK SESSION STAFF REPORT <br />