Spokane County commissioners yesterday reaffirmed their rationale for adding about a big chunk of land to the county’s urban growth area.The expansion increases the area where subdivisions, businesses and industry can locate. Commissioners approved the 3,600 acre expansion in 2013, but the changes were sent back to them by the state Growth Management Hearings Board on an appeal by a coalition of neighborhood groups.
Here’s why many citizens weren’t happy about the annexation and why Commissioners defend it.
So here’s why its’ a concern to us at SRTC- while much of the area to be annexed has homes and businesses on it already, every time a new development is built on the fringes of the urban area, roads have to be built to reach them. Then they have to be maintained. We already have thousands of miles of roads we can’t maintain. In many cases, developers are required to pay impact fees for road maintenance but it doesn’t always work out with all infrastructure.