Walla Walla County adopts higher building, planning and fire permit fees over commissioners' objections

Walla Walla County commissioners on Monday adopted updated fee schedules for building, fire and planning permits in Ordinance 506, approving across-the-board increases the county says are needed to recover staff costs and overhead.

Acting Community Development Director Melissa Schumake told the board the proposal is based on detailed spreadsheets that account for staff time, benefits and the mix of reviewers involved in permit processing. "It's based on staff cost," Schumake said. "It includes benefits ... reevaluating the amount of time that different kinds of permits and projects take to process." She said the department also added roles the county lacked the last time fees were revised, which increased the total cost base.

Commissioner Clayton said she was unpersuaded by that argument and objected to the size of the increases. "I have a hard time increasing fees for services that have not met expectations in my opinion," Clayton said, arguing service delivery and customer experience in planning and building remain inconsistent. Clayton said many proposed increases average 10% to 20% and the county should show sustained operational improvement before raising fees further.

Commissioner Kimball and Commissioner Fulmer supported the change, saying fees should cover the department's true cost so taxpayers are not subsidizing private development. Kimball noted the update represents two years of changes and the addition of staff intended to speed permit turnaround.

After debate the board voted 2–1 to adopt Ordinance 506 amending Walla Walla County Code Chapter 3.08 and associated fee tables. The motion passed with Kimball and Fulmer voting yes and Clayton voting no.

The acting director said most individual fee changes are in the mid‑range (around 10%) with some higher outliers, and that the department will move forward with implementation. The ordinance text on timing and effective dates was not specified in the hearing transcript and will be reflected in the county's adopted code posting.

The ordinance follows a public‑hearing process the county reopened after not finalizing similar fee changes the prior year. Commissioners asked staff to consider shifting to an indexed approach (such as CPI) for future adjustments to avoid repeating full spreadsheet updates.

The board handled several other items during the meeting, including continuing the public hearing on the 2026 budget to Dec. 23 and approving routine contracts and personnel items.