Land-use planning impacts how our community grows and adapts to increased development pressure, and natural disasters such as wildfires and droughts. Okanogan County recently released their Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) and the accompanying Comprehensive Plan which was unchanged from the November 2018 version.

Unfortunately both of these documents fail to meet the basic standards required of either a Comprehensive Plan or DEIS. Other counties, such as Chelan, have been able to produce high-quality comprehensive land-use planning documents. Residents of Okanogan County deserve a thoughtful Comprehensive Plan that adequately addresses the issues we face in our region.

Currently the DEIS as presented is not a helpful tool for decision-making. It is not clear and provides information that is frequently inaccurate and sometimes even misleading.

Our dream is that Okanogan County will have a great plan and zoning for conservation of our regions watersheds. In our view that is a lot of what the Citizens Council is all about.