Jacob Dimond / jake@yelmonline.com
During the Yelm City Council meeting on Tuesday, Jan. 20, Gary Cooper, City of Yelm planning and building manager, held a second public hearing in regards to an interlocal agreement (ILA) between the city and Thurston County.
During the meeting, he told councilors and the audience that the ILA was previously approved in December of 2025 by Yelm City Council. After the original meeting last month, Cooper said it was discovered that the word “hearing” was not published on the agenda for that meeting.
“Although we did publish it in the newspaper, we provided notice, just to be double sure that we’re compliant with the Open Public Meetings Act, we’re bringing it back again tonight,” Cooper said.
He said the ILA between Thurston County and Yelm would not approve an annexation, but rather establish what the city’s roles and responsibilities will be if annexation is eventually approved.
There will be a public hearing at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 27, in Yelm City Hall regarding annexation.
“(ILA) is more or less a laundry list of how the county would pass the baton to the city if we were to annex,” Cooper said. “It’s things like getting a list of public works projects that are underway in the county, that the city would then need to coordinate with them on somehow assuming any unfinished work, stormwater fees and maintenance that the county has collected and could transfer to us, property records. If there are any open permits in the area that we’re annexing, we will actually take over those permits.”
Additionally, Cooper noted that Yelm would process those permits using Thurston County’s rules and regulations, as “it wouldn’t be fair” for someone already involved in the application process to have to change rules halfway through the process.
“There was a question of what’s next for the ILA and the county. Basically, at this point, up until you decide to annex, the county is pretty much out of the picture because the county already approved this ILA. It’s up to council to then decide whether or not to annex,” Cooper said. “The next time the county would be involved at all would be in executing this in our interlocal agreement.”
The Thurston County Board of County Commissioners voted on Tuesday, Dec. 16, to approve the ILA on its end, following the original vote of unanimous approval by the Yelm City Council on Tuesday, Dec. 9.
“The ILA process is important because then we, from the onset, get into partnership, frame that conversation and frame what that handover looks like, so that our interests are considered,” said Thurston County Manager Leonard Hernandez in December, regarding the Thurston County Board of County Commissioners’ vote.
