The Centralia City Council on Tuesday voted unanimously to declare a temporary moratorium on permitting applications for large warehouses and distribution centers exceeding 250,000 square feet.
The ordinance was approved on a first and final reading during the council’s business meeting, as city staff believe the move qualifies for an emergency requirement due to state guidance regarding permitting timelines. Ordinances are usually brought to the council for a first and second reading.
This measure comes after the city recently permitted a 600,000-square-foot warehouse facility along northwest Harrison Avenue that will increase truck traffic along the heavily used road. Combined with the current truck traffic in the area, staff have concerns about worsening congestion along the thoroughfare.
In response to this and the possibility that more warehouses and distribution centers of this size or larger might be forthcoming, city staff proposed a temporary six-month pause upon the permitting of such developments until the city can further determine the impacts of such developments on its infrastructure and community.
The moratorium will not impact distribution centers and warehouses that are already open and operating, nor will it affect large facilities that are considered vested, or have already gone through the permitting, design and engineering processes and are moving forward under previously approved guidelines. A map displayed to those in attendance at the meeting showed nine proposed facilities within city limits and in the city’s urban growth area (UGA) that were expected to come through the pipeline for development within the next six to 18 months, City Manager Michael Thomas said. Only two currently operating facilities, UNFI (1.1 million square feet) and Michaels (710,000 square feet) exceed 250,000 square feet, although the recently permitted facility would be 600,000 square feet.
The city is actively working to update its comprehensive plan and zoning ordinances by the end of this year, in accordance with state guidance. Concurrent to this process, the city is attempting to determine the impact of current and planned developments upon its infrastructure, including water, sewer and roadways, as well as the community overall.
The city will host a public hearing on the moratorium on Oct. 28 during its council meeting to accept public comment. With the Sept. 9 approval, the moratorium, if it runs in its entirety, would go through Feb. 9, 2026, but the council can vote to rescind the moratorium sooner or even extend it if necessary.
“We’re not taking huge swaths of land away so you can never develop on this, but during this period of the moratorium, if you’d like to build something in this available land, it needs to be 250,000 square feet or smaller,” Thomas said. “And if we get to a point where we as the city, but mainly you as the council, decide that we’re going to go in this direction or that direction with the square footage size requirement, zoning requirements, etc., then that would be the new standard that would be applied to those post-moratorium. The main intent behind this is to limit the strain that’s being placed upon our infrastructure, water, sewer, but predominantly the road and traffic ways.”
Thomas also said there is an environmental impact on not only the city but also the nearby Fords Prairie Elementary where much of the truck traffic travels.
“A lot of this truck traffic, if these projects were to go in as they are planned, they would enter Harrison at that intersection,” he said. “If you’re thinking about pedestrian safety, crosswalk safety, kids coming and going from schools, now you’re adding potentially a dozen more trucks per day, or maybe two or three extra trucks per cycle.”
The moratorium the city approved is modeled upon the City of Vancouver’s moratorium upon the development of large warehouses and distribution centers.
One argument against the moratorium brought by public commenters was the potential tax benefits that distribution centers and large warehouses would bring. Utility taxes would have been collected both within city limits and the UGA, with the UGA bringing in a higher rate of collection. The city would have also collected property taxes and a one-time construction tax, but only for properties within city limits.
However, first responders, namely the fire department, have expressed concerns to the city about response time on Harrison Avenue. All of the current and proposed structures would funnel traffic onto Harrison Avenue, which councilors said is a specific complaint they hear from constituents. Centralia Police Chief Andy Caldwell said that while police vehicles can navigate through traffic easily, large apparatuses of fire districts have a tougher time.
“The congestion when heavy trucks are taking up all the available lanes, it does create significant problems for them,” he said. “Anecdotally, my concern is more for the fire districts because I don’t know how bad it’s going to impact us. If it is a significant impact, then yes, it is going to delay our ability to respond to non-emergency calls.”
Thomas added that many of the proposed properties are Port of Centralia zone properties, and that the city is working to better align itself with the port’s master plan regarding zoning requirements. Port Commissioners Kyle Markstrom and Peter Lahmann spoke during the public comment section, clarifying that while they were not speaking on behalf of the port or as commissioners, they were not in favor of the moratorium. Lahmann expressed a desire for the port, city and county to collaborate on a plan.
“I didn’t really learn about this until just a few hours ago. I think we should have a town hall and have a discussion about the traffic issues and the infrastructure,” Lahmann said. “I would like to see the city, the port and the county sit down and have a standard plan and development for our various areas.”
Markstrom noted that the City of Vancouver exempted its partner port from their moratorium and expressed interest in looking at doing something similar in Centralia for continued economic development.
“I am not in favor of this moratorium. I have many concerns about the moratorium itself and the process,” Markstrom said.
Leah Sisemore, a former Centralia councilor and current candidate for this fall’s general election for the District No. 2 seat, argued that the emergency clause doesn’t justify passing the normal process of approving an ordinance and that it “risks undermining public trust” by “cutting the public out.”
Shelley Snelson, a Centralia resident, told the council that while she is “probably your resident that has been the most impacted by all of this,” she believes the city needs the jobs and tax benefits from the proposed developments and that the infrastructure can be fixed in other ways. She also said trucks can detour through Grand Mound.
“We do need those jobs. It’s not retail, but we have the outlets. Now, if we get some better businesses in there, we might have more people buying,” Snelson said.
Each of the councilors expressed their desire to sit down with the port and the county along with the urgency to halt potential influxes of truck traffic on already congested areas of the city’s roadways.
“I’m generally uncomfortable with the idea of a moratorium, just because it’s an extreme measure for government to utilize,” Mayor Kelly Smith Johnston said. “This moratorium is very narrowly targeted. It is targeted at distribution [centers] and warehouses 250,000 square feet and above. The reason for that is that those structures are the ones that are likely to produce the most traffic. The map continues to show that there would be a tremendous impact to Harrison, the exact impact I don’t think we can calculate.”
