Walla Walla County commissioners on Aug. 25 directed staff to prepare ordinances to dissolve an inactive irrigation district and a small flood-control district after public hearings showed the entities met state criteria for inactivity.

The action follows a public hearing on four junior taxing districts that county staff said had not met state reporting and auditing requirements. The commissioners said Tusche Valley Irrigation District Number 16 and the Waitsburg flood-control district meet the statutory tests for inactivity and asked the clerk to work with the prosecuting attorney to draft dissolution ordinances. Commissioners left Mud Creek Irrigation District Number 7 and Loudoun Irrigation District Number 2 intact for now and told their representatives to contact the Washington State Auditor’s Office to pursue audit remediation.

Karen (county staff) reviewed the law and the county’s obligations under state statute, citing RCW 36.960.01 et seq., and explained the county’s limited role in bookkeeping for junior taxing districts. She told the board that a district declared "unauditable" by the state auditor loses routine access to county processing for paying bills, and that dissolution, if pursued, triggers a required process for settling obligations and distributing remaining funds to the county under RCW 36.960.07.

City Administrator Randy Hinchliffe of Waitsburg told the commissioners the city had already been performing local flood-control work and asked that, if the Waitsburg flood-control district is dissolved, the county consider returning dissolved assets to the city for future flood-control efforts. He said, "the city would support dissolution of the Waitsburg Kapi'i Flood Control District," and urged the county to consider how any remaining funds could be used for local flood work.

Acting secretary Ed Quattle spoke for Mud Creek and Loudoun II irrigation interests and described those two districts as small conveyance districts that currently have no physical assets beyond their canals but have roughly $113,000 held by the county in aggregate. Quattle said the districts have been declared "unauditable" by the state auditor and that the districts may pursue a state audit and short-term measures to spend down funds to allow them to administer their affairs more directly. "We're not going to dissolve; we're a functioning district," Quattle said, adding that the landowners intend to continue irrigating and hoped to resolve bookkeeping and audit matters so funds could be accessed.

Commissioner Todd Fulmer said he believed Tusche Valley Irrigation District Number 16 clearly met the statutory criteria for dissolution. Commissioner Todd Kimball said he agreed that district 16 met the criteria. Commissioner Mike Clayton joined the other commissioners in asking the clerk to coordinate with the prosecuting attorney to prepare dissolution ordinance language for those districts the board agreed are inactive. The board voted to close the public hearings for each district (each closure carried 3–0). The commissioners did not adopt any dissolutions at the meeting; they gave staff the direction to prepare ordinances and to return to the board for any formal action.

The board explicitly distinguished the outcomes: formal action to dissolve will require a future ordinance and legal steps; the two irrigation districts represented at the hearing will pursue state audit remediation. Karen told the room that, under RCW 36.960.07, any monies remaining after paying obligations and dissolution expenses first go to the county to cover costs and only thereafter become county property (subject to other statutory provisions). Quattle and another speaker emphasized the audit costs (about $2,500 per audit in the recent experience) and the small annual budgets of the districts — Quattle said the two small irrigation districts together have roughly $113,000 held by the county and that an audit previously cost about $2,500 per district.

Next steps: the commissioners asked the clerk of the board to work with the prosecuting attorney to prepare dissolution ordinances for Tusche Valley Irrigation District Number 16 and the Waitsburg flood-control district. The board directed Mud Creek Irrigation District Number 7 and Loudoun Irrigation District Number 2 to work with the Washington State Auditor’s Office to resolve unauditable findings; the board did not direct staff to prepare dissolution language for those two districts.

The hearing record and commissioners’ direction mean a formal ordinance to dissolve the named districts will be drafted for future consideration; dissolution itself was not adopted at the Aug. 25 meeting.