[Klickitat] 🧸 The Childcare Zoning Crisis - White Salmon April '26 Round-Up

In this episode, we dive into the April meetings for the White Salmon City Council and the White Salmon Tree Board. We’re looking at a growing push from residents for municipal childcare solutions, the rising costs of our water infrastructure, and why a procedural rule might accidentally doom a historic oak tree.

In This Episode:

• Water rates, reservoir cleaning, and the search for new infrastructure funding.
• How new state mandates are forcing changes to police body camera public records.
• The city's strategic grant application for the Bluff Trail's southern trailhead.
• The Tree Board's battle against a flat-fee loophole for developers cutting down mature canopy.
• The delay on the Gaddis Park volunteer cleanup.

Resources & Links:

• Read the full written Dispatch at skamaniadispatch.com
• White Salmon City Council Agendas & Minutes: whitesalmonwa.gov
• White Salmon Tree Board Agendas: whitesalmonwa.gov
• Documenter notes are available for republishing under Creative Commons license CC by 4.0. Please credit Columbia Gorge Documenters, powered by Uplift Local, and link in show notes to https://upliftlocal.news/columbia-gorge/columbia-gorge-documenters/

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Transcript

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Hey there. Welcome back to our municipal roundups. Today we're looking at the April wrap-up for the City of White Salmon. We have updates from both the City Council and the Tree Board. A big theme across both of these groups this month is growing pains, and yes, that is a treat button. White Salmon is actively trying to update its foundational policies, from public records to development fees to tree preservation. And at the same time, the city is hunting down significant grant funding to support a population that just keeps expanding. Let's start with the city council. Right out of the gate, we need to talk about childcare. As you've heard on our prior episodes, that is quickly transitioning from private family struggle into a massive municipal and even countywide hurdle. Resident Gabrielle Gilbert and a group of local advocates presented to the council about the urgent child care shortage we are facing not only across the county, but in particular in the city of White Salmon. They pointed to a successful multi-agency childcare center out at the port of Morrow called Play Frontier as a blueprint of what could potentially work here. The advocates are urging the council to look at our local zoning. They want the city to actively remove bureaucratic barriers to make it easier to build and run childcare facilities right here in city limits. As we discussed in prior episodes, building a childcare center or refurbishing an existing building requires a lot of kid-focused safety upgrades, which present serious financial hurdles to opening new facilities. It's why it can be so meaningful for cities to reduce other legal and administrative costs that can make it easier to offset that financial risk to getting started. It's a great example of how residents are asking the city to rethink what infrastructure really means. It's not just roads or water pipes anymore. It's the services that allow our workforce to actually go to work. Speaking of water pipes, though, we shouldn't forget about those. Maintaining other kinds of infrastructure is sure getting expensive. The council unanimously approved a contract for nearly $44,000 to have a company come in and completely inspect and clean all of the city's water storage reservoirs. To help figure out how to pay for long-term capacity, the council also passed a budget amendment to fund $30,000 water rate study. They're also studying capacity at the Bingon Water Waste Treatment Plant. So here's the bottom line on your water bill. The city is realizing that current user fees probably won't cover escalating costs. Because of this, the Operations Committee is actively researching something called system development charges. Basically, these are one-time fees placed on new development to make sure that people building new houses and businesses are the ones who are expected to pay for expanded water and sewer lines rather than shifting that burden onto you, the existing ratepayer. Moving over to public safety, the council officially updated the city's public records policy. This is entirely tied to police body cameras. You know that we're big fans of privacy over here at the dispatch, and the state of Washington has strict exemptions for body camera footage. If a minor is caught on tape or if a video shows the inside of a private home or a hospital, the city has to rigorously blur faces and redact the audio before they can legally release that video to the public. It takes specialized software to meet that need, and it eats up a lot of staff time. But the city's new policy gets them into compliance with that law. So, in Parks News, the council approved a grant application to the state's recreation and conservation office. They're asking for money to develop the Southern Trailhead for the Bluff Trail. The city is trying to time this perfectly so it aligns with the future roundabout that would be built for the Hood River White Salmon Bridge replacement. We'll be following up with our monthly update for that in a next episode. Also on the park's front, a resident named Kelly Mitchell, representing the American Legion and the Freemasons, asked the city to help them find a spot in a public park to plant a tulip poplar liberty tree. It's a sapling meant to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the United States. It's a nice gesture, but it will also be a bit of a logistical hurdle for the city. Finding a spot really isn't the issue, but it's committing limited public work staff to heavily water and maintain a new tree for the next two summers in parks that are already pretty full. In a climate that we're seeing is increasingly pretty dry. And that's actually a perfect transition. Let's turn over a new leaf and get to the white salmon tree board updates. We're preserving our local canopy is proving to also be harder than it sounds in a few other ways. Right now, if a developer removes a tree and doesn't replace it, the city charges them a flat a flat placeholder fee of $400. The tree board is urgently trying to change this. They argue that a flat fee just acts like a loophole. It's so low that it's cheaper for developers to just cut down mature trees and pay a fine rather than design their projects around them. The board wants to draft a detailed fee schedule that charges developers based on specific species and age of the tree they cut down. They're trying to hit developers in the wallet to force them in preserving the canopy we already have. But even when residents want to preserve a tree, the city's rules have a few complications. Board member Craig Wilson is currently trying to nominate a massive 350-year-old oak tree as a heritage tree. The problem? The tree is on private property near the bridge project. And the tree board just discovered that the city's current written ordinance forces the person nominating the tree, not city staff, to get written legal consent from the property owner. Sounds like a great opportunity to build some new neighbor-to-neighbor relationships around some of our favorite plant life here in city. So finally, a quick note on community events. If you're planning on heading out for the Gaddis Park volunteer cleanup, hang on just a little bit longer. The board had to delay the event until later in May. Public Works has to go into the park first and cut down some hazardous dead trees before it's safe for volunteers to get to work clearing brush and defining pathways. It's clear that we're going to have to get a really strong plan around all of our trees, new and old, before we can move forward this summer. To get all the exact dates on upcoming city events, read the jargon busters, or find the links to official agendas, make sure you check out the text version of this newsletter. This audio update was built in part using notes by the Columbia Gorge Documenters, powered by Uplift Local. You've been listening to a production of opengorge.org, the home of the Scamania Dispatch, and the Click of Taddler. We believe that informed communities are stronger communities. To support our work and stay up to date on everything happening in the gorge, or to tell us about your favorite tree, head over to schemania dispatch.com to sign up for our newsletters. You can also find us on Facebook at Facebook.comslash open gorge. Join the conversation and share your thoughts on today's episode. Thanks for tuning in, and we'll talk to you next time.