16135 Railway Rd SE Microsoft Office Outlook - Memo Style (11)Gary Carlson
From: Jim Park and Barb Wood [parkwood @ywave.com]
Sent: Thursday, April 07, 2011 9:49 PM
To: Gary Carlson
Cc: Shelly Badger; Grant Beck
Subject: Fw: Use of 16135 Railway Rd
Hopefully this makes it
- - - -- Original Message - - - --
From: Jim Park and Barb Wood
To: Gary Carlson
Cc: Shelly Badger; Grant Beck
Sent: Thursday, April 07, 2011 9:20 PM
Subject: Use of 16135 Railway Rd
Hi Gary,
We rec'd your notice today, April 7, 2011, regarding complaints about cattle at 16135 Railway Rd. The parcel is 11.9
acres, with a 5000k sq. ft barn, and a small farm house. It is fenced and cross fenced, with an electric New Zealand fence
system.
We are perplexed on what would have resulted to any complaints? In fact, the photos show happy cattle, in the middle of
the 11 acres If you could provide more information on the nature of the complaints, that would be helpful, and we could
address them.
When this property was annexed in 1995 ( ?), it was requested that our agricultural practices be grandfathered in for future
use. In that request and approval; cattle, horses, hogs, chickens, and hay production were called out as existing
agricultural practices that were to be grandfathered in as long as the property was held by the owners at the time. That
was part of the annexation approval on our part. And the City approved that request. The City should have records that
support that. While, the property has been sub - divided, between the original owners, it is still in the legal ownership of
originals owners of the property when it was annexed into the City.
In the last few years, we have invested over 15k in barn renovation and a superior fence system for the sole purpose of
raising hay and cattle at the property. This investment was based on the fact that we had a grandfather agreement to
continue agricultural practices after the property was annexed.
Additionally, while it is in a R6/1 zoning, the City has a no build ordinance that refers to the FEMA FIRM map. That map
has dictated that the majority of the parcel is not available for residential buildings, regardless of zoning.
While it is hopeful that the City will re- evaluate the FEMA FIRM map, based on the fact that delineation of the "floodplain"
was based on a HEC -RAS model, which does not evaluate the relationship between surface and groundwater. And the
fact the Yelm Creek is a ground water fed system, which FEMA has no authority to regulate. In addition, the Department
of Ecology has recently removed Yelm Creek as a Shoreline of the State, as defined by the SMA WAC, because it no
longer sustains a mean annual flow of 20 cfs.
As my phone message stated, we are available tomorrow afternoon to discuss the situation
Thanks much,
Barb and Jim