House Bill 1164 adds a new section to chapter 36.70A RCW and amends RCW 36.70A.110 and RCW 36.70A.130 to require counties and cities that plan under the Growth Management Act to expand urban growth area (UGA) boundaries, beginning with the next comprehensive plan update after the bill’s effective date, to include certain parcels that share a boundary with or are across the road from residential parcels that are within a UGA, developed or approved for residential development, and have access to or are planned to receive urban services. For parcels included under the new criteria, the local jurisdiction must authorize residential development at the same density as the referenced neighboring parcels and permit buildings to use and connect to available urban services. The bill creates new procedural and substantive limits on where expansions may occur and on implementation. It expressly excludes adding critical areas and buffers (with a limited exception allowing single-family detached houses in certain critical aquifer recharge areas if recharge requirements are met), certain sole source aquifer areas on Puget Sound islands, watersheds listed as impaired or threatened under CWA section 303(d) as of the bill’s effective date, lots designated as urban separators, lots created by splitting a single residential lot, and lands designated for long-term commercial significance for agriculture, forest, or mineral resources. It prohibits expansion into defined 100-year floodplains of rivers west of the Cascade crest with mean annual flow of 1,000 cfs or more, subject to enumerated exceptions. The bill also requires meaningful early consultation and specified notification methods with potentially affected federally recognized Indian tribes about proposed UGA revisions, and mediation under RCW 36.70A.040 if no agreement is reached. It clarifies certain limits on an obligation to extend sewer systems to some properties within UGAs under a 20-year planning period. The measure also makes procedural changes to periodic review and update requirements under the Growth Management Act: it restates continuing review duties for comprehensive plans and development regulations, carries forward and updates multi-year schedules for periodic reviews by county groups, requires implementation progress reports for certain counties and cities five years after a plan update, conditions some grant and loan eligibility on meeting review deadlines or demonstrating substantial progress, and requires jurisdictions that have not implemented required measures to adopt a work plan and complete the work within two years. The extracted text is incomplete in places: the bill’s effective date is not stated here, the identity of “the department” referenced is not specified, parts of several subsections are cut off mid-sentence, and the full amended text of RCW 36.70A.130 and any related legislative findings or fiscal details are not included.

If enacted, counties and cities will have to expand urban growth boundaries at their next comprehensive plan update to include parcels that border or sit across the road from already residential parcels that have or are planned to have urban services, and they must allow those newly included parcels to be developed at the same residential densities and to connect to available urban services. That change will make more properties potentially developable for housing, while still barring inclusion of many sensitive or resource areas (certain critical areas, specified aquifers and watersheds, designated urban separators, split residential lots, and long-term agricultural/forest/mineral lands) and restricting expansion into large river floodplains west of the Cascades except in narrow circumstances. Counties must consult federally recognized tribes early about potential cultural and treaty impacts and use at least two notification methods; unresolved disputes go to mediation. The groups most directly affected are counties and the cities in those counties, which will need to do extra planning work, revise zoning and development regulations, and adjust capital facilities and transportation plans to serve the added parcels—actions that can raise planning and infrastructure costs and change local service responsibilities. Adjacent property owners stand to gain new development options and access to urban services. Meeting the new update schedules and critical-area rules also affects eligibility for state grants and loan preferences, so jurisdictions that comply may be more likely to receive funding while those that fall short could lose priority; key details such as the bill’s effective date, the named department responsible for certain reviews, and some procedural text are missing from the provided excerpts, leaving some implementation questions unresolved.