Got land?

A few splotches of color on a new map will determine whether it may be subdivided and how many houses may be built on it.

A colorful draft countywide zoning map is a big part of Lewis County's years-long struggle toward compliance with the state's 1990 Growth Management Act.

The map, still being revised, allows one home per 5 acres in some parts of the county and one home per 10, 20 or 40 acres in other places, sometimes with densities changing several times in a single neighborhood.

For a county that until 10 years ago had no zoning, creating palatable growth regulations has been a long, tortured process.

It's still not over, but it took another small step Thursday night.

Inch-thick packets of paperwork and giant maps with patches of blue, yellow and purple were formally passed from a temporary citizens commission to the county's formal planning commission.

Since July, a 12-person Citizens Advisory Committee has decided just how big small towns should get and exactly how sprawl can be prevented in the county's rural areas.

"This wasn't a 'by gosh and by golly, that looks good,' process" said committee Chairman Ron Averill about the group's reworking of the county's zoning maps.

The maps were based on flooding, wetlands, aquifer recharge, slopes, wildlife and a number of other considerations, Averill said.

Previously, the county had suggested determining density on a lot-by-lot basis using soil dampness and slopes. A state hearings board nixed that idea.

Committee member Karen Knutsen of Onalaska disagreed with the way the new maps were created.

She presented a "Minority Report" to the planning commission, expressing her view that the 12 committee members were not allowed to see the base data that went into the maps.

"What information or goals guided our choices? None, it was pure guesswork based, apparently, on trying to escape planning as much as possible," Knutsen wrote.

She criticized the process for not including data from state agencies such as the Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Personal knowledge and anecdote were substituted for hard facts, Knutsen said.

Two of the most vocal and tenacious opponents of the county's previous plans received compliments at the meeting.

Gene Butler and John Mudge, two members of the group calling themselves the petitioners, but often called "the Dirty Dozen" by critics, were thanked for their comments, 80 percent of which ended up in the newest plans, Averill said.

Toledo committee member Doug Stinson took his appreciation further.

"None of us would be here if they hadn't opposed the original plan," Stinson said. "I think someday there'll be generations in Lewis County who'll be very, very thankful for Gene Butler and John Mudge."

Stinson's comments generated weak and scattered applause.

Both men expressed reserved approval of the process, although Butler submitted a document criticizing several areas of the plan, including clustering, public participation, and the process by which the maps were created.

Butler's language echoes the series of harshly worded rulings by the Western Washington Growth Management Hearings Board that have required the county to try, again and again, to craft a plan that directs most growth into urban areas and preserves the rural nature of the county.

Lewis County is hedging its bets, combining an exhaustive replanning process with lawsuits aimed at having earlier plans upheld.

"There won't be any action on appeals before this process is finished," said the county's Olympia growth management attorney, Alexander "Sandy" Mackie.

The plan also would allow rural businesses existing in 1993, the cutoff point for compliance with GMA, to change the nature of their business as long as the new use was "rural" in nature and scale.

Previous plans would have strictly limited change.

Under the county's plan existing lots of record, even those plots smaller than 5 acres would continue to be valid as long as they could support a septic tank.

Unfortunately, no one in the county knows exactly how many of these small lots of record might exist.

The county commission, in its budget approved earlier this week, allocated $85,000 to create an exact map of legal lots of record.

Knutsen and Stinson said there might even be too many of these small, yet legal, plots of land, more than can be supported by existing water resources.

Information about the growth management process, including copies of the maps and documents, is or soon will be available on the county's Web site, www.co.lewis.wa.us on a link at the lower left.

Information will also be available in local libraries and senior centers.

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Brian Mittge covers local government for The Chronicle. He may be reached by e-mail at bmittge@chronline.com, or by telephoning 807-8237.