Clark County Assessor Peter Van Nortwick recalled attending a Washington Association of County Assessors meeting where one of his counterparts from a smaller county joked that larger counties had plans to eliminate the smaller ones.
“It does make sense,” Van Nortwick, a Republican, said he concluded after mulling the idea.
Now Van Nortwick, along with Democratic County Treasurer Doug Lasher, are drumming up support for the idea of merging the state’s 12 most sparsely populated counties, such as Skamania County (population 11,300), with their larger, better-funded neighbors, such as Clark County (population 435,500). The two have crunched numbers from the state’s Office of Financial Management and estimate their proposal could save $90 million annually.
The two also are proposing a constitutional amendment to require counties to have a population of at least 25,000 or merge with a neighboring county.
The two have presented their ideas to state officials and legislators. State Sen. Ann Rivers, R-La Center, said she initially scoffed at the idea but said in the upcoming legislative session that begins next month she will introduce a bill to study the impact of merging smaller counties.
“I’m not saying this is the best course; I’m saying let’s have a look and see,” she said.
Rivers said her bill will be introduced at a time when counties across the state are struggling to raise enough revenue to provide services. But she acknowledges that it’s “fraught with political peril.”
State Rep. Sharon Wylie, D-Vancouver, said she’s heard similar proposals over the years, and while this one makes some sense, it could be “a slap in the face to the small counties and the people who live there.”
Lines stay steady
It’s rare for county lines to be redrawn. Brian Namey, spokesman for National Association of Counties, said that nationally about three dozen counties have been consolidated in the past 200 years, which he said usually involved a public vote.
It’s similarly rare in Washington. The state constitution gives the Legislature power to create or dissolve county governments, which it last used to create Pend Oreille County in 1911, a time when a county seat was meant to be a one-day wagon ride away, Van Nortwick said.
According to the Municipal Research and Services Center, a nonprofit that advises local governments in Washington, there was a wave to create new counties in response to the passage of growth management laws in the 1990s. Other legislative proposals concerning county lines have been floated, yet Washington’s 39 counties have remained intact.
“The way I look at it is counties are a subdivision of the state, and if you haven’t looked at how you are set up in 100-some years you’re not really managing this properly,” Van Nortwick said.
While counties collaborate on issues such as public safety or transportation, Van Nortwick and Lasher analyzed OFM data and concluded that consolidating the state’s 12 smallest counties into their neighbors would lead to lower tax bills and more efficient use of tax money.
According to their analysis, the property tax for counties with a population of 10,000 to 30,000 is $331 per resident. For counties with a population ranging from 300,000 to 1 million, the per capita property tax is $186. He also found that counties in the 10,000 to 30,000 population range received 42 percent of their funding from the state or federal government whereas counties in the 300,000 to 1 million range received just 27 percent of their money from these sources.
“It would be a really disruptive process for quite a while,” said Bob Hamlin, chair of the Skamania County Board of Commissioners, of merging with Clark County. He said figuring out how Clark County could assume emergency services, road plowing as well as legal issues surrounding road easements and right of way wouldn’t be straightforward. He also points out that 80 percent of the county is in the federally managed Gifford Pinchot National Forest, which brings its own complications.
Skamania County Assessor Gabe Spencer wrote in an email that consolidation may indeed be more efficient, but questions if the quality of services would be maintained.
“Would Budweiser buying our Backwoods Brewery improve the quality of the beer for their drinkers?” he wrote.
But Lasher said many county functions, such as viewing and paying tax bills, can be done online and a satellite office could be set up. He said that a study on consolidating counties could at least reveal some ways for county governments to consolidate services in some areas.
Cash-strapped counties
Laura Berg, policy director for the Washington State Association of Counties, said she hadn’t heard of any talk of consolidating counties or studying the idea and was skeptical. She said that counties provide some of the most basic services of government, particularly public safety, and are strapped with mandates but restrained from raising revenue.
Under state law, county governments typically can’t increase total property tax levies by more than 1 percent plus new construction per year. The situation has left counties (including Clark County) unable to meet rising expenses, and the association will be lobbying lawmakers in the coming legislative session to lift the cap, Berg said.
Rivers said that counties already collaborate with other governments to do more with less and it makes sense to at least look at consolidation. Rivers said her bill is being drafted and didn’t have details.
“When you are talking about something this serious, you should have some really good data so your decision can be data-driven and not emotionally driven,” she said.
