County consultants present agricultural land study data; farmers press for water-rights, countywide mapping and boots-on-the-ground checks

Clark County Community Planning staff and Echo Northwest consultants on Sept. 24 presented a draft agricultural resource land study and asked the Clark County Agricultural Advisory Commission for feedback on the datasets and mapping methods that will help determine lands the county may classify as agricultural resource land under state guidance.

The study team showed several data “lenses” — NRCS soil capability classes, SSURGO soil quality ratings, the American Farmland Trust productivity/versatility/resilience (PVR) index, Washington State Department of Agriculture (WSDA) crop and irrigation maps, and county current-use program enrollment — and asked commissioners and nearby farmers to flag errors and gaps before the report is finalized and sent to the county council and planning commission.

Nut graf: The work is intended to meet state administrative-code criteria for designating agricultural lands and to feed the county’s comprehensive-plan update and draft environmental impact statement. Consultants and staff said county input and ground truthing from local farmers will help avoid mistaken classification of productive fields, and several speakers urged adding water-rights data and countywide soil maps so officials can see acreage lost to urbanization.

Barrett Lewis, an Echo Northwest consultant, described the study’s focus: “We are determining whether lands are used or capable of being used for agricultural production,” and explained the team was presenting multiple publicly available datasets so the commission could “gut check” results on the ground. Oliver Jacko, a Clark County Community Planning staff member, framed the project as a technical analysis whose findings would be used by the council: “I don't know what the study is going to say,” he told the commission, noting any boundary or designation changes would be a policy decision for the county council.

Major datasets and reactions - Soils: The team showed both the NRCS eight-class land capability ratings (1–4 generally farmable; 5–8 not fit for farming) and SSURGO/USDA soil-survey classifications. Consultants said the NRCS classification focuses on physical limitations (slope, erosion, water hazards) while SSURGO reflects soil properties under optimal conditions. Several farmers disputed specific patches labeled “not fit” on the NRCS-derived map and requested finer-scale checks. - Productivity index (PVR): The American Farmland Trust score was presented as a composite measure of productivity, versatility and climate resiliency. The consultants mapped areas above the county average and noted roughly 29% of the study area met that threshold; commissioners and farmers questioned some highly graded spatial variability within single fields and asked for methodological detail. - Crop cover: Satellite-based national datasets (e.g., CropScape/NLCD) showed large shares mapped as grassland/pasture; a state WSDA agricultural layer (a hybrid of field surveys and imagery) produced a markedly different breakdown with higher measured acreage of hay, silage and other crops. Several farmers said the WSDA layer aligned better with on-the-ground conditions. - Irrigation: WSDA site-survey irrigation data showed irrigation is limited in the study area — the consultants reported 11% of cropland in the study area is recorded as irrigated and 16% within the agricultural designations. Farmers asked the team to overlay Ecology/WSDA water-rights records, noting many older water rights are recorded but not actively used and that historical rights matter for potential irrigation expansion. - Current-use enrollment and parcelization: County GIS shows roughly 26,000 acres in the farm/agricultural current-use program within the study area, with most parcels small in count but the largest acreage in 20–100 acre farms. Consultants and several commissioners noted heavy parcel fragmentation in Clark County: roughly two-thirds of parcels are smaller than 5 acres, and much of the total agricultural acreage is concentrated on larger, conforming parcels.

Commission and public feedback Commissioners and several farmers emphasized three areas for additional work: (1) a countywide soils/SSURGO view that includes lands outside the current ag designation so the county can see prime soils already in urban growth areas or formerly designated ag forest; (2) a water-rights overlay drawn from state Ecology/WSDA maps; and (3) more ground-truthing or a county-level farm-use inventory so small-scale and specialty producers are represented. Commissioner Joe Zimmerman warned the commission to consider acreage context, saying the study as mapped would reduce the designated acreage under review: “We have excluded 41,560 acres of prime ag land,” he said, pressing the team to show what prime soils were left outside current designations.

Consultants and staff noted scope limits and timetable. Barrett Lewis said the team intends to rely mostly on publicly available data with localized verification, and Oliver Jacko said the study area was broader than just current ag-designated parcels so the team could identify potentially missed areas. The team also noted legal constraints: forest land and agricultural land are separate resource designations under state law and past county decisions mean some lands cannot be simultaneously designated as “forest” and “agriculture.”

Next steps and deadlines The consulting team and county staff asked the commission and public to review maps and submit corrections. The timeline shared at the meeting: an open house and public workshops to gather input before the team finalizes a report (the project schedule targeted a final consultant report in early November and a county work session with council in mid-November). Staff also noted a draft environmental impact statement tied to the comprehensive-plan update would be published with a public comment period.

Ending: The commission did not take any designation votes at the meeting; instead members were invited to review the material, attend the scheduled workshops and forward any local data (soil surveys, water-rights pointers, parcel/production evidence) to county staff to be incorporated before the report is finalized.