SAMMAMISH COUNCIL v. City of Bellevue
| Decision Date | 20 August 2001 |
| Docket Number | No. 47786-2-I., No. 47252-6-I |
| Citation | 29 P.3d 728,108 Wash. App. 46,108 Wn. App. 46 |
| Parties | SAMMAMISH COMMUNITY COUNCIL, a municipal corporation; and East Bellevue Community Council, a community municipal corporation, Respondents, v. CITY OF BELLEVUE, a municipal corporation, Appellant. City of Bellevue, a Washington municipal corporation, Appellant, v. East Bellevue Community Municipal Corporation, a Washington community municipal corporation; and Sammamish Community Municipal Corporation, a Washington community municipal corporation, Respondents. |
| Court | Washington Court of Appeals |
Jay Palmer Derr, Samuel Wilmore Plauche, Kitteridge Oldham, Seattle, for Amicus Seattle King County.
Alan Copsey, Asst. Attorney General, Olympia, for Amicus Dept. of Comm. Trade.
Peter Dykstra, Seattle, for Amicus American Planning.
Peter Ramels, H. Kevin Wright, Seattle, for Amicus King County.
Roger A. Pearce, John Tayloe Washburn, Richard L. Settle, Seattle, Richard L. Andrews, Lori Molander Riordan, Bellevue City Attorney, Bellevue, Elaine Louise Spencer, Graham & Dunn, John Richard Aramburu, Law Offices of J. Richard Aramburu, Seattle, for Appellants.
John Aramburu, Seattle, for Respondents.
In these consolidated cases, we are asked to define the disapproval authority given to community councils by RCW 35.14.040. Although RCW 35.14.040 gives community councils final decision-making authority, it limits that authority to, inter alia, zoning ordinances and amendments to the comprehensive plan that apply to land, buildings, or structures within the community councils' respective geographic jurisdictions. The first issue is whether the Sammamish Community Council and the East Bellevue Community Council (the councils) had the authority to disapprove City of Bellevue Ordinance 5081, which amended the Traffic Standards Code (TSC) governing the calculation of traffic volume and traffic capacity. The second issue is whether such disapproval affects how the TSC is applied to land use developments outside the councils' respective geographic jurisdictions.
Because Ordinance 5081 is not a zoning ordinance and because changes governing the calculation of traffic volume and capacity set forth in Ordinance 5081 do not require an amendment to the comprehensive plan, the councils did not have disapproval authority. And even if they had such authority, the councils' disapproval would affect only how the TSC is applied to land use applications for developments within their respective geographic jurisdictions.
Whenever unincorporated territory is annexed by a city, a community municipal corporation governed by a community council may be organized for all or part of the territory annexed. RCW 35.14.010, -.020. Community municipal corporations "have no inherent powers and possess only such powers as are expressly conferred by statute or implied as necessary in aid of those powers which have been expressly conferred." 2A McQuillin, Municipal Corporations, § 10.03, at 299 (3d ed.1996) (footnote omitted). The powers of the community municipal corporations in Washington are set forth in chapter 35.14 RCW. RCW 35.14.040 authorizes the community councils to disapprove specific types of city ordinances or resolutions:
The adoption, approval, enactment, amendment, granting or authorization by the city council or commission of any ordinance or resolution applying to land, buildings or structures within any community council corporation shall become effective within such community municipal corporation either on approval by the community council, or by failure of the community council to disapprove within sixty days of final enactment, with respect to the following:
(1) Comprehensive plan;
(2) Zoning ordinance;
(3) Conditional use permit, special exception or variance;
(4) Subdivision ordinance;
(5) Subdivision plat;
(6) Planned unit development.
Disapproval by the community council shall not affect the application of any ordinance or resolution affecting areas outside the community municipal corporation.
....
The Growth Management Act (GMA) requires cities planning under the act to include within their comprehensive plans a transportation element that, among other things, specifies "level of service" standards for local streets and roads. RCW 36.70A.070(6)(a)(iii)(B). "Level of service" (LOS) is basically a measure of the degree of intersection saturation, expressed as the ratio of the peak traffic volume at the intersection to the capacity of the intersection to handle traffic. A LOS "standard" constitutes the ratio beyond which the intersection is deemed overly congested. Under the GMA, development is prohibited if it would cause the LOS at relevant intersections to drop below the applicable standards "unless transportation improvements or strategies to accommodate the impacts of development are made concurrent with the development." RCW 36.70A.070(6)(b).
The City of Bellevue implemented the GMA requirements through its comprehensive plan and the TSC. Before Ordinance 5081 was adopted, the City defined the peak volume of an intersection as the number of vehicle trips during the 60-minute period between the hours of 4 and 6 p.m. when traffic volume was at its greatest. To determine the traffic capacity of an intersection, the City employed "Transportation Research Circular No. 212".1 On the recommendation of a transportation task force, however, the City amended the TSC's methods for determining traffic volume and traffic capacity by adopting Ordinance 5081 in July 1998. Under Ordinance 5081, the City measures peak traffic volume by averaging the total number of trips between 4 and 5 p.m. and the total number of trips between 5 and 6 p.m. Bellevue City Code (BCC) 14.10.010(0). And the City determines traffic capacity using "Transportation Research Board Highway Capacity Manual, Special Report 209" rather than "Transportation Research Circular No. 212." BCC 14.10.010(S). The City's rationale for amending the TSC was to change the method of calculation to more realistically assess traffic patterns in light of variable work schedules.
Both the Sammamish Community Council and the East Bellevue Community Council objected to Ordinance 5081, claiming that the new methodology would allow more traffic to occur without violating LOS standards. Thus, the councils argued, the City could effectively allow more development without having to meet the concurrency requirements of the GMA. The councils therefore disapproved Ordinance 5081, purporting to exercise their authority under RCW 35.14.040 to disapprove certain ordinances "applying to land, buildings or structures" within their jurisdictions.
The City resisted the councils' actions, claiming that Ordinance 5081 is not an enactment that the councils have the authority to disapprove. As a result, the councils brought the present suit in superior court, asserting two theories: that the ordinance effectively modified LOS standards and therefore should have been adopted as an amendment to the City's comprehensive plan, and that the councils had the authority to disapprove the ordinance under RCW 35.14.040 because it was a zoning ordinance applying to land, buildings, or structures.
The councils moved for summary judgment, and the City moved to dismiss the portion of the councils' complaint regarding the comprehensive plan amendment. The trial judge granted the City's motion concerning the comprehensive plan based on the following reasoning:
It is my determination that Ordinance 5081 is not inconsistent with the comprehensive plan based on the materials that have been provided. The comprehensive plan is not so specific that it can or should require [amendment] for a computational methodology or mechanism for how to measure level of service.
Addressing the councils' remaining theory—whether the councils had the authority to disapprove Ordinance 5081 under RCW 35.14.040—the trial judge concluded that Ordinance 5081 is a zoning ordinance subject to community council disapproval because it effectively allows more development than was previously allowed. Relying on this ruling, the councils contended that their disapproval requires the City to disregard Ordinance 5081 when applying the TSC to a proposed development located anywhere in the City that may impact the volume-to-capacity ratio of intersections within the councils' geographic jurisdictions. The City then sought a declaratory judgment that community council disapproval of Ordinance 5081 had no effect on the City's application of the TSC to proposed development located outside of their jurisdictions. The councils counterclaimed, seeking a declaration that:
a) the disapproval of Ordinance 5081 applies to all intersections within the geographic areas of the Community Councils and b) that the city must act to enforce the terms of the Community Councils' disapproval by applying these levels of service to intersections in Community Councils areas that existed before the Ordinance 5081 in making land use decisions.
The trial court agreed with the councils, entered a declaratory judgment in their favor, and dismissed the City's complaint. These appeals followed.
The City maintains that RCW 35.14.040 does not authorize the councils to disapprove Ordinance 5081. Although the City does not dispute the councils' authority to disapprove certain zoning ordinances, it argues that the TSC as amended by Ordinance 5081 is not a zoning ordinance and does not apply to land, buildings, or structures.
The term "zoning ordinance" is not defined in chapter 35.14 RCW. But zoning is commonly understood to regulate the use of property by controlling property improvements. The Supreme Court has described zoning as follows:
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