Staff recommends approval of three Clark County open-space tax assessments, including shoreline tract on Lacamas Creek

Hunter Decker, Clark County’s county forester with the Department of Public Works, told the Planning Commission on March 5 that staff is recommending approval of three open-space current-use assessment requests: two historic properties and a stream-protection reclassification. "We got three requests for the open space assessment," Decker said, "two of them do meet the historical preservation ... and then we also have one request that needs the stream protection."

The first application is for the William Frederick Hoffman House, a 0.52-acre parcel registered with the county heritage register and built in 1912; Decker said staff recommends approval of the 0.52 acres. The second is a 0.09-acre historic parcel that includes a bakery building at 506 Washington Street, which staff also recommends approving because it appears on a historic register.

The third application would reclassify a portion of a larger parcel for stream protection. Decker described an 11.43-acre tract carved from a 38.13-acre property at 19502 Northeast 19th Street in Vancouver that lies within the Lacamas Creek shoreline management area; staff advised that tract would qualify for stream-protection classification under county criteria and recommended approval of the 11.43 acres.

Decker summarized the legal framework that governs the program: state statute RCW 84.34, corresponding administrative rules (WAC 458-30) and Clark County Code chapter 3.08. He told commissioners the assessor’s office recently updated its application form and that the assessor monitors listed properties and handles potential delisting at sale or when a parcel no longer meets program criteria. "I went through and called the state ... that study does not exist," Decker said when asked whether a Department of Natural Resources water-resources study referenced in code was available to identify qualifying springs; staff therefore relied on the county shoreline master program and internal mapping for the stream-protection review.

Commission members asked several process and scope questions: whether listing changes liability or tax exemption (staff clarified listing changes assessment to current use rather than conferring an outright exemption), what obligations owners have to preserve historic qualities and what maintenance or public-access expectations attach to reclassified open-space tracts (staff said public access may be required in some circumstances but is not an automatic permanent public right and that maintenance is typically assigned to a homeowners association when a tract is part of a subdivision).

At the close of the session staff confirmed its recommendation to approve all three applications. The Planning Commission scheduled a public hearing on the cases for two weeks; no formal commission vote on the applications was recorded at this work session. The meeting was then adjourned by Chair Carl Johnson.