Correction 3/5: I originally listed Doug Skrobut’s first name incorrectly.
Annexation “Pretty much a done deal,” committee chairman says.
By Chris Henry
chenry@kitsapsun.com
SOUTH KITSAP
Property owners in McCormick Woods have given the green light to an
annexation of the residential development into the City of Port
Orchard, the McCormick Woods Annexation Committee announced
today.
The committee has collected signatures on the annexation petition
representing slightly more than 75 percent of the assessed value of
property within annexation boundaries. That’s the threshold of
approval required by law. The committee will now forward the
petition to the Port Orchard City Council for approval.
It will be an easy sell.
City officials have been working with McCormick Woods residents for
more than a year on the annexation. It would add roughly 2,000 new
citizens to the city, whose most recent population count stands at
just over 8,000.
Committee members have been working since October to collect the
required number of signatures on the petition. The recent addition
of Feigley Road Partners LLC and Chaffey Corporation added roughly
$12 million to the assessed value of properties approving the
annexation. The total taxable value of properties to be annexed is
$374,970,745.
One large property owner than has not yet signed the petition is
Gem I, the corporation that oversees McCormick Land Company
holdings. With property valued at $17.9 million, Gem I was
seen
as a potential kingpin in the annexation. But the company was
leery of signing on the dotted line until an interlocal agreement
between Kitsap County and the City of Port Orchard had been
completed, said spokesman Brad Doug Skrobut. The
company’s vested interest in how the transfer of responsibility
would be made results from development agreements Gem I made with
the county long before the issue of annexation came up.
The annexation committee has purposely avoided relying on
corporate-owned properties to achieve the 75 percent goal, said
chairman Dick Davis. Instead, they focused on gathering signatures
from individual homeowners, because they wanted to show that there
is widespread support for the annexation.
‘While we did get a developer and a builder to push us over the
edge, it was mostly individual homeowners,” Davis said, “We’re
still hopeful Gem I will jump into the pool with us.”
The committee has gathered 550 signatures out of approximately 800
individual households or property owners. The Kitsap County
Assessor’s office has been validating signatures as they come in,
and committee members will continue to gather signatures as
“insurance,” Davis said.
Although the numbers could change slightly if the assessor finds
questions on some properties, “it’s pretty much a done deal,” Davis
said.
Once the petition has been approved by the city, it will go before
the Kitsap County Boundary Review Board then back to the city
council for final approval.
Addendum 12:43 p.m. Wednesday:
Dick Davis just sent me this information.
Total assessed value is $379 million; 75 percent of this is $284
million and they have surpassed that by a bit.
Total taxable assessed value is $375 million. According to Kitsap
County assessor Jim Avery the committee only needed to get 75
approval for taxable properties, but Davis said the committee chose
75 percent of the total value as their goal to leave nothing to
uncertainty.
