05/31/2006: "Wolf in Sheep's Clothing Back Again"

By Jay Kimball

When the County Council holds a public hearing, it's a good day when four or five people show up. People work hard to get by and hope that our elected representatives will watch out for the public interest. Imagine the Council's surprise when the guesthouse hearing last month drew so many people that they had to set up chairs out in the hall for the overflow crowd. One Council staffer said they had never seen so many people at a public hearing.

Over 90 percent of the people testified in favor of guesthouses. Some folks were so upset by the Council's lack of accountability and integrity that they suggested it was time to discuss recall or impeachment of the County Council. Though the Council limited testimony to two minutes each, so many people testified that the hearing ran out of time and was extended to the following week. At that hearing, the council said that they heard the will of the people loud and clear, and by the end of the meeting the council practically fell over themselves to convince the public that they were all for detached guesthouses.

Edward R. Murrow said of politicians, "Our major obligation is not to mistake slogans for solutions." Let's take a look at their latest solution. As the saying goes, "the devil is in the details." The council took the first four pages of the greasy September kludge Lichter and Ranker had cobbled together with the "Friends" and stir-fried it with the Draconian planning-commission version of the guesthouse ordinance. Not a pretty sight. The ordinance now contains 63 paragraphs of county code changes. If all the council really wanted to do was allow detached guesthouses, they could do it in three paragraphs. So the question is, "What are the other 60 paragraphs about?"

The answer: restrictions and prohibitions. No guesthouses on rural lots of less than one acre, waterfront lots of less than five acres, ag resource parcels less than 10 acres, and forest resource parcels less than 20 acres. In addition, guesthouses are prohibited more than 100 feet from the main house. Additional accessory buildings such as a barn, shop, studio, etc. would be prohibited on parcels of 1-5 acres that have an ADU permit for an ADU and a garage. If there is already a legally permitted guesthouse over 1,000 square feet, then construction of the main house is prohibited unless there is sufficient density for an allowable second residence. Guesthouses are prohibited in any existing structure that does not meet all of the new requirements.

The list goes on. Short-term rentals of guesthouses are prohibited. No guesthouse can be larger than 1000 square feet. The guesthouse must use the same driveway as the main house, and must have a full water membership regardless of whether it is required by the Health Department or the water purveyor. No construction of permitted guesthouses in existing orchards, meadows or pastures or areas of native plants, wildflowers or forest, on ridgelines or rolling or steep slopes. Isn't that pretty much the whole island? And that's just a sample. We will need a gaggle of lawyers with Cap'n Crunch decoder rings to file a simple permit.

And when you apply for a permit for a detached guesthouse, no more than 12 percent of prior-year single-family residential building permits will be granted a detached guesthouse permit. This means that less than 24 per year would be available for the whole county. The Council's smooth talking aside, the ADU ordinance is a control freak's nightmare.

When one of the councilmen was asked about the basis for the 12-percent cap, the 100-foot limit, no rentals, and all the other micromanagerial gobbledygook, he replied, with a confident smile, that they were "arbitrary." Though arrogant, his candor was refreshing.

Why would the council saddle the public with 60 paragraphs of "arbitrary" law? This sort of malfeasance will just ensure extended lawsuits, court battles and wasted taxes. In a conversation with one of the three "Friends" who are suing the county to prevent guesthouses, I asked about the 100-foot limit. The answer again was candid — it was to discourage people from renting their guesthouses out. The logic being that a homeowner would not want a "stranger" near his or her home.

So the hidden agenda starts to reveal itself. I asked a councilman, "Why take away people's guesthouses to address a concern about rentals? Why not be up-front and propose a rental ordinance?" and he said "Oh, that would be a big mess!" and I said, "You've got an overflow crowd calling for your impeachment. As messes go, it doesn't get much bigger than that!" He just smiled.

Guesthouse rentals are the dirty little secret that the council and "Friends" never speak to, but it keeps showing up in every version of the ordinance they try to pass off on the public. I ask again, why are concerns about rentals being addressed in an ordinance about guesthouses/building permits and not in an ordinance about rentals?

The council is running us through the wringer because they lack the courage to take the Friends' elitist agenda to the public in an honest way. We are a service economy that depends on affordable housing for the working class. With the lowest working wages in the state and the highest cost of living, the middle class needs every means at its disposal to make a living — including, on occasion, renting out their guesthouses. The council knows that a direct assault on the working people's ability to earn a living would be political suicide, so they try to sneak it through the back door.

There is no need for this special interest riddled ordinance. I posted the latest version of the Council's guesthouse ordinance at www.OrcasStyle.com. Take a look at it and see what you think. Ask the council to stop wasting our time and let the courts decide. The final public hearing is June 6 at 1:30 p.m.

George Washington said of our democracy, "Only the citizen can make government responsive and accountable, and keep them honest. No one else can." Now is the time.