A. Title. The ordinance codified in this chapter may be referred to or cited as the transportation mitigation ordinance, or “TMO,” and will be referred to herein as “this chapter.”

B. SEPA Policies. This chapter is adopted as a policy under SEPA for the purpose of articulating and implementing the city’s SEPA transportation policies, as authorized by RCW 43.21C.060 and Chapter 197-11 WAC. In addition to the policies in this chapter, the city’s SEPA transportation policies include policies in the comprehensive plan (and its land use, shoreline and transportation elements) and other SEPA policies affecting transportation, which have previously been adopted as SEPA policies in Chapter 19.43 EMC. This chapter is a compilation of and replaces existing previously adopted traffic mitigation ordinances as provided by Section 19 of Ordinance 3387-14.

C. Purpose and Authorization. This chapter enables the city to: (1) study transportation impacts of proposed private and public projects; (2) identify mitigation measures or other alternatives that would avoid potentially significant adverse environmental impacts of proposed projects; and (3) address any adverse impacts of proposed projects to the transportation system and to local transportation networks.

D. Fees for System Improvements. This chapter also provides a method of fairly distributing the costs of transportation system improvements in accordance with the impacts resulting from proposed projects. Fees collected under this chapter are intended to mitigate impacts to the transportation system that are reasonably related to new development and may be collected and spent only for public facilities, traffic management, and traffic mitigation programs needed to accommodate new development. (Ord. 3774-20 § 5(Z) (Exh. 3), 2020.)