Critical Areas Ordinance (CAO)
Protect Critical Areas
Klickitat County’s newly drafted CAO represents a serious step backward for conserving, protecting and restoring critical areas. Friends of the White Salmon is bringing community members together to advocate for stronger protections. Would you like to help?
Protect Land, Water, and Life
The Critical Areas Ordinance (CAO) is a set of development regulations that all cities and counties in Washington State must write and adopt, under the state’s Growth Management Act (GMA). The county must identify local critical areas and protect them. The CAO guides how each county processes development applications.
Every ten years, counties and cities are required to take legislative action to review and, if needed, revise their CAO to make sure it reflects advancements in science, and addresses local environmental and safety concerns.
For every community, there are at least three reasons to protect critical areas:
- To protect the public from threats to human safety and to protect public and private property from natural hazards.
- To protect the environment and enhance the state’s quality of life.
- To preserve environmentally sensitive areas that are valuable to the public and provide ecological function.
The Newly Revised CAO Lacks Scientific Integrity
What’s the Problem?
Under the GMA, local governments must:
(1) designate critical areas
(2) protect their functions and values
(3) ensure no net loss of ecological function.
Klickitat County’s newly revised CAO does not do any of these things.
Local governments are supposed to use best available science in developing policies and development regulations to protect the functions and values of critical areas. The CAO is also supposed to give special consideration to anadromous fish, such as salmon and steelhead.
Klickitat County’s newly revised CAO does not use best available science.
The revised CAO written by Klickitat County’s Planning Commission, includes broad exemptions that give the Planning Department wide discretion to approve development. These exemptions are loopholes that erode the very protections the CAO exists to support.
Instead of ensuring that critical areas are preserved for future generations, the newly revised CAO prioritizes making nearly every parcel developable. This approach reflects a focus on landowner profit and property development, rather than compliance with the GMA’s environmental protection standards.
What Are the Impacts of Inadequate Science?
The decisions made now may lock in patterns of development and habitat loss for decades.
Damage to critical areas can lead to:
- Erosion, flooding, and landslides that destroy homes, roads, and farmland.
- Shorelines that don’t keep rivers cold.
- Loss of fish and wildlife habitats, putting salmon, steelhead, and other rivers species at risk.
- Contaminated or depleted supplies of drinking water.
- Rivers and streams negatively impacted by chemical contamination, increased temperature, and sediment.
- Disappearance of threatened and endangered species from the area entirely.
What We are Doing About It
The newly revised CAO draft is not approved yet!
what we are working on
Preparing for Hearings: We are reviewing Klickitat County’s newly drafted CAO line by line, identifying weak spots, and preparing suggested amendments based on peer-reviewed science.
Building a Critical Areas Technical Committee: This committee will include scientists qualified to review critical areas in Klickitat County and recommend appropriate protections.
Forming a Critical Areas Advisory Committee: This is a community-based committee made up of local residents and organizations to bring diverse voices to the process. This committee will help the Technical Committee identify and prioritize areas that matter most for protection in the county.
How to get involved
If you’re interested in making Klickitat County’s CAO stronger, join our alert group to get information about upcoming hearings and how to participate and/or volunteer for a committee:
