Thurston County is looking to draft regulations for the housing of sex offenders, according to the county’s recently approved docket of development code amendments.
The Board of County Commissioners (BoCC) approved the docket on Tuesday, April 2. It contained a staff-initiated proposal titled “Less Restrictive Alternative Community Housing Code Update.”
The proposal is about developing regulations for group facilities that will provide court-ordered housing, security, and treatment services to “sexually violent predators.”
According to the Revised Code of Washington (RCW) Chapter 71.09, the state legislature finds “sexually violent predators” as individuals with personality disorders or mental abnormalities that render them likely to engage in sexually violent behaviors.
The facility will provide these individuals with a less restrictive alternative to total confinement. According to the proposal's description, housing will also apply to individuals who pose a risk of serious harm to others and are civilly committed to a less restrictive alternative.
The proposal only received four responses during the commenting period of the docketing process.
One commenter favored the proposal, writing that people need to be moved out of total confinement.
Two people wrote that they did not understand the proposal, while the last one misunderstood it as a form of affordable housing.
The docket's approval means staff will now work to develop the amendments, which will eventually return to the BoCC for approval. The docket for the development code contains 12 items overall, most of which were initiated by county staff. Several of these proposals were carried over from the county’s last docket two years ago.
The document also contains one citizen-initiated proposal submitted by Jeff Merryman, who seeks to amend certain provisions regarding cannabis.
The proposal requests for the term ‘marijuana’ to be replaced with ‘cannabis’ and to revise definitions of various terms surrounding cannabis. Merryman also wants the county to consider revisions for setback and lot size requirements for cannabis operators.
The BoCC itself submitted a proposal to modify the timeline for public comments on properties undergoing the State Environment Policy Act (SEPA) review process.
Other proposals include three annual updates dealing with code clarifications, corrections, the permitting review process, and new land zone uses. Three more deal with updates to the code of the urban growth areas of Olympia, Lacey, and Tumwater.
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hptrillium
What are the details of this plan?A less restrictive plan is important but I would want to know exactly how this would work. I did not know that public input was being asked for. No wonder people were confused because no good explanation was given.
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