Rural Residents Urge Split From King County

NORTH BEND - If sometime in 2007 King County is a fraction of its former self, and a large swath of the eastern and southern portions of the county bear a different name, then the campaign that made it happen started Thursday night in North Bend.

About 100 people packed the Sallal Grange hoping they were there for the birth of Cascade County.

John Hearing of Maple Valley led the group through a two-hour presentation to lay the groundwork for the latest effort at secession from Washington's largest and most populous county. He likened the effort to a "do-over," a chance he said to correct the problems he and others see in King County.

"We get a do-over," he told the crowd. "We basically can call a time out and we're going to get another chance at the ball. We get a chance to remake our government and maybe come up with a government that will pay attention to the citizens out here."

The last attempt to create a new county in the more rural sections of King County failed in the late 1990's. The petition drive to create Cedar County was eventually blocked by the state Supreme Court.

The court ruled that a new county cannot be formed until the legislature puts a specific county-forming process into law.

This time, Hearing says they'll approach it differently. He hopes to organize an initiative that will spell out the rules and regulations statewide for creating a county. Then a second signature drive from within the as-of-yet undetermined boundaries of the new proposed county will be presented to the legislature for approval.

Proponents of a new county believe they have the momentum and motivation to make it happen this time.

King County's Critical Areas Ordinance places limits on what some rural property owners can do with their land, the still contested governor's race didn't put many a rural voter's preferred candidate in office, and the farther you get from downtown Seattle the more upset voters seem to get over stadium, Sound Transit and other taxes they feel benefit the big city and not them.

"Maybe the King County government doesn't pay attention to us or doesn't really care much about what we think," said Hearing.

Hearing said the best-case scenario would be approval of a new county by 2007.

For now he's merely testing the water to see if there is enough anger and momentum south and east of Seattle to make another attempt at creating the first new Washington county since 1911.