A Future of Growth
This article originally appeared in the Walla Walla Union-Bulletin, November 19, 2006.
By TERRY McCONN of the Union-Bulletin
"Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning."
"Life is change.. Growth is optional. Choose wisely."
"He who moves not forward, goes backward."
"Change is inevitable, growth is intentional."
"All growth is a leap in the dark, a spontaneous, unpremeditated act without benefit of experience."
"If we're growing, we're always going to be out of our comfort zone."
The above are famous quotes about growth. Local folks have some choice words about it, as well. The opinions are widely known and diverse. Some people say to opt out entirely and discourage newcomers at all costs. Others want us to plan more effectively. Still others recognize only benefits to more people moving to the Valley.
Most, however, see the pros and cons through a pragmatic lens.
As Walla Walla City Manager Duane Cole put it in a recent interview: "You can't put the wine back in the bottle. It's going to change the dynamics."
Tourism - based largely on the wine industry - has been booming here. In 2005, about 390,000 visitors came through the county and spent more than $71 1/2 million, an all-time high.
Fueled by a lodging tax, marketing "has been successful beyond all people's wildest dreams," Cole said.
And, perhaps surprising to some, many "are looking around and decide they'll live here."
Not in huge numbers yet, but many have big bank accounts, local experts say. Overall, growth in Walla Walla County has been moderate and steady, according to the Office of Financial Management. The population is estimated at 57,900, including about 2,720 additional noses since the census in 2000. The 4.9 percent gain puts Walla Walla 25th in. growth among the state's 39 counties.
But during that period, the housing inventory saw only a 1.2 percent gain. It’s economics 101, said Scott Revell, the county's director of Community Development.
"If you constrain the supply and the demand continues to rise, prices will go up."
Some real-estate agents point to the state's Growth Management Act as one of the culprits. Passed in 1990 and amended in 1991, the law requires certain counties and cities to plan for anticipated growth 20 years into the future and to set urban growth boundaries designating` where such concentrated growth can occur to prevent sprawl. Walla Walla County and its incorporated cities decided to join the state's GMA planning process.
The county already is quite urbanized. Seventy-two percent of the population lives within city limits. Tied with Spokane County, it's the fifth highest percentage of all 39 counties in the state.
The Urban Growth Area surrounding Walla has been expanded—mostly to the south and southeast—over the years beased on an estimated population increase of about 9,000 people by 2025.
Demand for land
The land is starting to be consumed. From 1993 to 2003, the county issued an average of 65 new home permits outside city limits each year. This year, the county is on pace to see a 7 percent increase from the 136 permits issued in 2005.
Michael Fredrickson, a real estate appraiser for Associated Appraisers of Walla Walla, said the boundary should grow to allow housing development "at all levels" to encourage diverse neighborhoods and so people can "move up" to more desirable homes.
"We need to have a little more land in the urban growth boundary so that developers don't.have to recoup so much for the price of land," he said. "When you have limited supply, prices have gone up."
The largest minimum lot size is 9,600 square feet. And acreage that can be developed is in short supply, real estate agents say.
"There aren't enough of those acres for sale," said Doug Simcock, a broker for Windermere Real Estate.
According to statistics provided by Revell, nearly 1,000 lots in the county are in some stage of the planning process an may someday open for housing. In addition, there are known plans on drawing boards for an additional 1,000 lots or so, but subdivision applications for them haven't been submitted.
But such developments don't become available all at once.
One big building surge in Walla Walla came in the mid-1990s when 250-300 finished lots opened. At the time, 9,600-square-foot finished lots with curbs, gutters and utilities sold for $20,000 to $25,000.
"Those were absorbed by builders in three years. Then they needed the next round of land to buy," said Dennis Ledford, a broker with Coldwell Banker First Realtors.
Because of static supply and increased demand, the price of such a lot rose to $30,000 to $40,000 by the turn of the century. Now, it’s anywhere from $70,000 to $100,000 just for that soil.
GMA takes blame
A December 2000 analysis by the National Association of Realtors slammed Washington's GMA. "From the viewpoint of the (Washington Association of Realtors), the GMA has had disastrous economic consequences resulting from too much centralized planning, flawed population projections, inadequate infrastructure investment, no real mechanism for accountability, resistance to change and too much emphasis on process versus substance.
"While the GMA is designed to accommodate projected population growth over the next 20 years by concentrating higher density development in urban areas, many local governments reduced the density of new residential projects s due to community opposition to high-density development."
The analysis foreshadowed a controversy in Walla Walla in 2003 and 2004. Opposition to the Triple Creek subdivision south of Walla Walla resulted in complex and costly litigation, local real estate agents say.
The initial proposal by Doug Majerus included 178 lots on 59 acres south of Reser Road between Cottonwood and Kendall roads. It was to be a mix of single-family residences, multiplexes and a neighborhood commercial development.
Lots ranged in size from 2,700 square feet to 2.2 acres.
But the preliminary plat request drew fire from neighbors and others who complained about housing densities, traffic problems, flooding concerns, lack of through streets and other issues.
The proposal ultimately was reduced to 61 lots after it was found the underlying zoning for the area prohibited commercial and multifamily uses at the time. The code since has been changed.
More lots may be approved in the future. But because the property was selling for $15,000 to $18,000 an acre, Walla "lost a huge opportunity for development," according to Ledford.
"(In general), landowners want to sell and take advantage of what the market is doing. But their neighbors want to look at the field."
Ledford believes attempts to block reasonable development often are without merit and shortsighted.
He points to a building boom in the 1950s after World War II and when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers came to town.
"There was no public outcry. They wanted young families in those homes," Ledford said.
Walla Walla County Commissioner Greg Tompkins agreed, saying, "If (opponents) fight everything we do, we're never going to get affordable housing."
Time to build?
Walla Walla is due for another round of building, Tompkins and others said. But lot prices are bound to continue rising.
Master planned communities built on smaller lot sizes, such as Triple Creek and Abito east of town, are not bad ideas, Ledford said.
“If it's well-planned, density isn't a dirty word. There are some exciting things happening in the western part of this state."
And he railed against what he called slow and cumbersome governmental processes. "They don't understand time is money to these people: They add layer upon layer of issues. Those things add up to what? Higher prices."
Through the GMA, communities designate areas most ideal and appropriate for development. But individual communities may be challenged based on where urban growth boundaries were drawn, said Glenn Crellin, director of the Washington Center for Real Estate Research at Washington State University.
"The boundaries were supposed to be drawn in such a way to accommodate 20 years' worth of growth," Crellin said.
In some cases, communities may have identified land that was vacant, but not actually usable. In other words, land might exist, but if the owner chooses not to sell then it's not available.
"Communities that paid attention to the utility of the land probably drew their boundaries in a more satisfactory manner," he said.
Crellin said the GMA has become a "very, very sensitive issue" because so many outlooks on its effectiveness exist.
Room to grow
Donovan Rypkema, of Washington, D.C.,-based real estate and economic consulting firm Place Economics, believes most communities don't lack developable land.
"I'm skeptical of that as a basic concept," Rypkema said. "I'd beta month's' pay that if we look out into the community, there's more land that's undeveloped than we can count."
Although there are exceptions—Carmel, Calif. is bound on three sides and faces the ocean on the fourth—most communities have untapped infill opportunities Rypkema said.
Walla Walla County officials said they've tried to make development easier by streamlining the permitting, process. Their efforts include empowering a hearings examiner to address certain decisions.
"Some of the regulations and restrictions on development have caused some consternations," Tompkins said. "But the GMA is not a bad thing" because it helps to organize growth and discourage sprawl.
That's not to say the planning process is perfect. Revell said more detailed neighborhood planning with mix of densities and uses—including some commercial development—would be beneficial. And Tompkins added that more commonsense requirements should prevail in encouraging development of vacant land in centrally located areas.
Why not allow a home owner in a single-family neighborhood to turn a detached garage into a rental apartment to help with the mortgage payment, Tompkins asked. "We've got to think outside the box."
Increasing density by "building up" should be considered, in addition to "getting more flexibility in what we're allowed to build," he said.
"Government's not the total cause of (rising housing prices). But we're part of it. No doubt about it."
Fredrickson—a Port of Walla Walla commissioner and a former member of the. county Planning Commission—doesn't believe government should force developers to build low-cost `homes. Nonprofit organizations such as Habitat for Humanity and Blue Mountain Action Council are pursuing creative ways to tackle the issue for low-income folks.
"But we probably, need to develop the full line," he said. "Yes, I think we need housing for (moderate-income people). Without them, we don't have a community."
A complex problem
Revell—who lives in South Richland due to the high cost of housing here—pointed out that technical and legal issues constrict the amount of developable land surrounding Walla Walla. Unlike the Tri-Cities, which added 3,500 acres to their Urban Growth Area and are experiencing a building boom leading to more-affordable prices, Walla Walla's growth is hampered by problems such as utility availability to the south and protection of designated farmland to the north.
In addition, there's the "not-in-my-back yard" opposition nearly everywhere.
Cole agreed that the GMA has, to a point, limited supply of land for housing in the Walla Walla area. "We put a boundary around the community. You can't plop a subdivision (just anywhere)," he said.
"We need more higher-density development. We need more land to develop." But Cole pointed out the issue is complex. "I'm not sure what the answer is."
He believes the rising price of houses may slow, but will remain high even if supply increases by building more homes on smaller lots. The developers will just receive more profit, he said.
Very high density, common-wall construction such as the recently approved 22-unit townhome complex in the downtown area may provide some alternatives, Cole added. "But can you build yourself out of (higher prices?) Probably not because the prices. aren't going to come down unless there's an economic, disaster."
On the flip side, Walla Walla is growing more prosperous. New people are coming with money, different ideas, perhaps with a different direction.
Is that good? "It's for you to decide. It's change," Cole said. "Some of it's good, a lot of it is bad. But here you are."
And people will continue to discover Walla Walla and move here whether existing residents like it or not, he pointed out.
Revell saw it in Hood River, where the price of property and taxes have become so steep, people are starting to move away.
"I don't think Walla Walla, following in those footsteps, is good for the community in the long run," he said.
Revell's job is to plan for growth. And Simcock believes that's the key.
"If we don't plan well, growth will affect our quality of life," he said. "To stop all growth, stop the building. But that doesn't stop growth. It creates a mess."
Walla Walla Mayor Dominick Elia sees good and bad in rising home prices. Owners are seeing a good return on their investment should they sell or refinance to fund improvements.
On the flip side, "Obviously a first-time person looking for property is finding it difficult," he said.
Elia agrees that the matter is complex and "it's a tremendous amount of factors that came together at one time."
But meet they did. "We have been found out," Elia said.
"Although it has been difficult, on the whole it's been a positive for, the community and the majority of the people who live here."
He believes answers lie in building on smaller pieces of ground and providing more flexibility in zoning laws.
Also, in accepting newcomers who agree this is a tremendous place to live.
Echoing Simcock, Elia said, "(Growth) is going to happen. We either manage it or it's going to run over us."
U-B Reporter Vicki Hillhouse contributed to this report.
